Samey Minus Amy
by Solarr-Eclipse
Summary: Pahkitew Island, with a twist: Amy's not participating in the season, and Sammy's going for the prize alone. She'll make friends, have fun, and just be generally happier than she would be had Amy joined the cast along with her, all in the hopes of coming out with an extra one million dollars. (AU; an OC will be added to fill the missing spot, but won't be the main character).
1. Prologue

"I'm Sammy. _Not_ Samey!"

She paused for a moment, wondering why on heaven, earth and hell she just said that.

"Uh, I don't even know why I said that. No one has ever called me Samey. I mean... who would, right?"

She nervously flicked her hair, realizing she needed to get back on track, and quickly.

"Anyway, I don't have a sister... or anything..."

Darn it, she did it _again_.

"It's pretty much just me. And I'm pretty confident, because of the no sister thing, and..."

She gulped, and took a quick glance out her window. Amy could be back from the mall at any moment, so she needed to get this done, _fast_.

"I guess what I'm saying is... I'd love to be on your show and I'll do my best to win no matter what! And, um, to make some friends along the way. I really need some... Uh, anyway! Pick me! ...Please?"

Sammy quickly stopped the video and rewatched it, wincing at almost every word that came out of her mouth. She _really_ should've prepared for this beforehand, but with her sister always breathing down her neck she never had a chance. She couldn't afford to record this while Amy was home, or else she might catch her doing it and attempt to audition herself... And the whole point of this was to get as far away from her as possible, so she could absolutely _not_ know Sammy was doing this.

She also couldn't afford to waste anymore time. Step one was finished, now she just needed to move on to step two: sending the audition tape in as soon as possible!

She saved it to her laptop and immediately started filling out the forms required for potential entrants to the show, including name (which she checked thrice over to make sure was spelled correctly), address, phone number, and all the other mandatory and optional fields. When the forms were filled, she attached them and the video file to an email and sent them straight along to the official Total Drama email address, in high hopes that she may actually become a contestant on it.

As soon as it was confirmed to be sent, Sammy hastily deleted the video, the sent email, and her entire browser history so that Amy wouldn't have a clue as to what she was doing if she went on her sister's laptop (which, unfortunately, happened far too often for Sammy to feel comfortable about).

And as soon as Sammy closed the laptop and returned to the book on her bed, the sounds of a convertible's engine and loud rock and roll started growing until it was just outside the house.

The younger twin sighed in both an odd combination of exasperation and relief. "Made it just in time..." she said in nothing more than a whisper, a small smile creeping onto her face.

The tricky part was over - now all she had to do was wait. But that was a small price to pay if the reward for doing so was the chance to spend some time away from her nightmare of a sister. She could just imagine a future like that now - no being forced to do anything she didn't want to, or called out on any minor mistakes she made. It would just be a fun summer trip, hopefully where she'd meet other people her age and, who knows, have a good shot at the million dollars on the side.

And little did she know, that future was about to happen.

...

Five weeks later, the phone rang.

Sammy removed one of the large headphones blocking her ears, setting her book down and listened intently to the sound of her mothers voice as she spoke to the caller. Every day, ever since she sent in the audition, her heart would race over the chance that whoever was calling at the time was from the decision makers for Total Drama. Despite it being a very long five weeks since she submitted it, she refused to lose hope in the endeavour, because who would say "no" to two weeks away from Amy?

On that note, two entire weeks! The thought alone made Sammy's heart beat even faster. No name calling, no insults, no pranks, no cuts or brusies or scars, no having to take the fall for her, no being the laughing stock between their friends, no having to do _anything_ for her! That was the only motivation Sammy needed to submit the audition. Of course, there was the new friends aspect and the prize money (which she truly _didn't_ need, in all honesty; her parents were somewhat wealthy anyway). But the main reason for her submission was the obvious, and even if those other reasons hadn't been there she'd still apply for the show.

Her mind snapped back to reality, and her heart rate increased tenfold, when her mother called her name.

She tentatively took the phone from her after she practically sprinted to the hallway, breathed in a deep breath to calm her nerves, and quietly answered,"H-Hello?"

_"Hi there, Sammy Sparkes? This is the producer for the Total Drama TV series. I was wondering if you'd be interested in partaking in our next season this coming summer?"_

Her breathing turned into short but loud gasps. Without a second thought, she replied, "Y-Y-Yes! Of course, I'd love to!"

The producer chuckled on the other side of the phone. _"Eager one, aren't you? Not to worry, we have plenty of space available for you. Ah, also, speaking of that..."_

Speaking of what? Available space? ...Uh oh.

_"There wouldn't happen to be... anyone in particular, you'd be interested in asking to take with you? We do have plenty of room on the island for one more."_

Sammy could feel the beads of sweat forming on her brow. The producers must have caught on to her mentioning a sister in her audition, a mistake she had been regretting since she made the darn thing. She stole a glance to the stairway just to her left, listening to the music emanating from Amy's bedroom at the far end of the hall and praying that her sister had no clue she was on the phone with someone. Her eyes lingered for a moment, before returning them to the wall in front of her in a scarcely used look of determination.

_'There's absolutely _no _way she's coming with me.'_

"No," Sammy told the producer with as much bravery as she could muster. "There isn't anyone else."

That warranted another laugh from the voice. _"Excellent! We'll be in contact with you in the coming weeks regarding your contract. Any questions you have, feel free to call this number and ask."_

"O-Of course! Thank you so, so much!"

Sammy was nearly in tears when the producer signalled the end of the call. Finally, _finally_, she was getting what she wanted for the first time in _ever_! No more being battered by her sister, no more having to listen what she says, no more having to answer anything she a-

"Who was that?"

...Crud. Wasn't she supposed to be in her room?

Amy was at the bottom of the stairs, looking at her younger sister with a cocked eyebrow. "Well? You gonna answer me, _Samey_? Or did you brain run away on you again, like it always does?"

Sammy internally cringed at that name. _'No more having to hear _that_ nickname either.'_ To her sister she just shook her head. "No one important to you, Amy."

That resulted in an even more confused look from her. Before she could say anything else, Sammy quickly put the phone back on the hook and made her way back upstairs past her sister, ignoring the cold stare coming from her as much as she could. She reached her bedroom door and swiftly closed it, locked it, and put her desk's chair underneath the doorknob (a better precautionary messure, she had realized a long time ago).

She sat on the edge of her bed, hands wringing across her lap nervously. _'Any second now... Three... two... one...'_

"_WHAT THE HELL?!_"

_'And theeere it is.'_

...

Another five weeks of enduring even more blood-thirsty attacks from Amy later, and Sammy was finally on the road to the airport that would send her off to British Columbia. This was the day she was waiting for, the day where she'd finally be able to prove herself to be a competent human being and not an (as Amy had so delicately put it) "actual piece of dog shit that wouldn't even be worth the time and effort to clean up". She definitely wasn't going to miss that, no sir.

Unsurprisingly, Amy had chosen not to go with her sister and parents when they left for the airport, so the trip to it was spent in the most blissful silence Sammy could remember. When they reached the building, Sammy gave both of her parents giant hugs and loving kisses goodbye, promising that she won't return home without something new, whether it would be friends, memories, or even the prize money.

_'Or maybe a boost in your self-confidence. God knows you desperately need that.'_

When she went through security and managed to find her seat on the plane, Sammy realized just how nervous she was. The entire time leading up to this moment was spent in anticipation for getting away from her sister, for being free of her bullying. But now that she _was _free, now that she was finally on her own and away from her, Sammy had enough time to think about just what it was she was doing.

She was going to be participating in a game show notorious for its dangerous challenges and chaotic hosts. For the first time since she sent in the audition tape, Sammy had second thoughts about whether or not what she was doing was the right thing to do. What if she got seriously hurt? Or worse, what if she was even voted off in the very first challenge? The entire last ten weeks would have been for absolutely nothing!

But thinking back to those last ten weeks, along with her entire life up till that point, and realizing just what she had to put up with, Sammy could say with absolute clarity that, yes, this was the best decision she's made since... well, since forever.

And she prayed, as the plane began to leave the ground, that things would only get better for her.


	2. Explosive Start

Even though she said that this was the best decision she'd ever made, it didn't stop the fact that Sammy was scared out of her wits.

The wait for the taxi cab to the meeting spot was terrifying enough, but actually sitting down in the probably-beyond-repair zeppelin, travelling what was most likely 30,000 kilometers above sea level in said broken aircraft, and being surrounded by thirteen strangers was plenty for her to get butterflies in her stomach. Demonic stomach-eating butterflies that were trying to chomp their way right out of her gut. That was usually the amount of anxiety that she frequently felt, so it was no surprise that it appeared in full force.

Judging by how the others were casually chatting with each other, though, they didn't seem to be feeling as nervous as she was. They were all doing normal things, like chatting with each other, calmly reading books, humming to themselves, casting spells at-

Sammy had to rub her eyes to see that, yes, there was indeed a boy dressed in a green wizard's cloak at the far end of the cabin, pointing a small jagged stick at one of the others.

_'...Okay, maybe not all of them are normal'._ But still, they seemed to be a lot more comfortable than she was feeling. She felt like she might throw up if the zeppelin hit a bad patch of wind...

"You feelin' alright there, mate?"

And it looked like she was showing it, too.

"Oh, uh-" Sammy turned her head around to the person sitting in the seat beside her. She was a _really _tall girl with an Australian accent, judging by her voice, and she was wearing what looked to be clothes meant for a safari tour or something. She was looking down at Sammy with a concerned look on her face. If only out of the habit of answering questions (implanted in her by Amy, of course), Sammy replied to her. "I g-guess I'm just feeling a little nervous, honestly... It's the first t-time I've been away from home by myself, so..."

"Ahh, I see," the girl replied with a smile on her face. "I know just what you mean. I remember the first time I set off from home for a while... Back when I was only eight years old and dear ol' dad let me spend the night in the plains behind the house all by myself." She sighed nostalgically. "Good times, good times."

"Only eight?" Sammy asked, shocked. To leave your child out in the open like that, where any wild animal could get to them... That was just crazy! What kind of parents did she have? "W-Wasn't that really dangerous?"

"Pfft, as if!" the girl laughed jokingly.

Sammy knew she should have realized that the girl was indeed joking, but having lived with someone who would constantly mock your incorrect answers sort of made her think the worst possible situation instinctively. And that worst possible situation was, of course, that the girl before her was making fun of her because of something she didn't know, like how it had always been back home. "O-Oh, I see..." was her reply, barely loud enough to be considered a whisper.

The girl, who must have heard that almost-a-whisper, quickly cleared her throat and continued. "By that I mean, nah, not at all. I'm a born 'n bred survivalist! There's not much in the terms of wilderness that I can't handle!"

"Oh... Really?" Sammy asked her, intrigued. Normally, she wouldn't really associate with anyone who liked to talk big or brag about their accomplishments (Amy being the exception, unfortunately), but if this girl was willing to correct her statement so that Sammy didn't get the wrong impression, then maybe she wasn't saying that to get attention? "Wow... That's really cool! I'm sure you'll be great at the challenges on the island..." Her face fell when she came to a realization. "At least you'll have a better chance than me at them..."

The girl's smile turned sympathetic. "Aw, c'mon now, don't go sayin' stuff like that! We don't even know what sorts of challanges we'll have to do yet. Who knows, maybe we'll have to somethin' you're good at!"

"Y-Yeah, hopefully we will," Sammy replied with a smile, but truthfully she wasn't exactly sure exactly what she _was_ good at. Considering Amy would always one-up her at everything they did, that didn't really leave much room for her to find anything she was good at herself...

The Australian girl before her stuck out her hand all of a sudden, snapping Sammy out of her self-deprecating thoughts. "Name's Jasmine, by the way. As you could probably tell I'm from Australia, but I've been livin' in Manitoba for a couple'a years now." Her smile turned into a smirk as she said, "And no, before you ask, our toilets do _not_ flush backwards there."

Sammy tried to hold back a giggle but failed - toilet humor wasn't exactly her style, but the fact that it just came out of nowhere had to deserve some credit. She reached out and grasped the taller woman's hand in her own, attempting to hold a smile on her own face. "N-Nice to meet you, Jasmine. I'm Sammy. I'm, ah, from Ontario. Toronto, specifically. A-As _you_ could probably tell, I'm a, um, cheerleader, for our school's sport teams, but I'm... uh, not really the best..."

"Oh, hush you," Jasmine as she shook the smaller girl's hand. Sammy noted that Jasmine's hand faintly tensed in her own. She must not have been too happy with her belittling herself like that. "I'm sure you're great at it!"

"O-Oh," Sammy stammered as she felt her face flush at the sudden compliment. She hadn't been exactly hopeful about receiving them throughout the show, let alone even before they reached the dang island, so having one come out of the blue like that was surprising. "I-I dunno about that..."

"No need to be so modest about it. I mean, they let you on the team, right? Or did you just steal that outfit when no one was lookin'?"

"What?!" Sammy looked up at her in surprise. "N-No, of course not! I would never steal! And... okay, well, yes, I _am_ on the team but that doesn't really mean I'm any good..."

"Oh, stop beating yourself up! I agree with Jasmine, I'm sure you're great at being a cheerleader!"

Sammy jumped at the loud and sudden non-Australian-accented voice and turned around towards the seat behind her to see another girl smiling at her from it. She had bright, strawberry-blonde hair that flowed down behind her, and a light blue tank top with white patterns and white knee-length shorts on her lower half. She also had a few necklaces around her neck and bracelets are her wrists, all of them of different lenghts and shapes. It was strange, Sammy quickly realized when she laid eyes on the girl's beaming face: even though she, herself, was one of the first of the fourteen at the meeting place, she didn't even recognize this girl... When did she get there?

"Hi there!" the new girl said with a grin, waving her hand vigorously despite being mere feet away from her. "And hi there again, Jasmine! Haven't seen you since the airport!"

"Yeah, which was like, what, an hour ago?" Jasmine replied, but seemed to be unable to keep from smiling a bit.

Sammy looked back between Jasmine and the new girl with a perplexed expression. "You two know each other?" she asked them both.

"Well, kinda. This is Lacey." The girl waved again as she was being introduced. "We met before we took off for the meeting spot. Which actually _was _an hour ago, you know." She giggled at a thought before saying, "It was kinda funny actually. See, I was waitin' in line for some food when all of a sudden she-"

"_Noooo_, nononono!" Lacey suddenly launched herself _on top of _Sammy in order to cover Jasmine's mouth and stop her from saying whatever she was about to say, conveniently ignoring the fact that there was a girl bent in a potentially spine-damaging position just below her. "W-We don't need to say that, Jasmine! C'mon, we're besties, right? Besties don't spill embarrassing secrets about each other, you should know that!"

Jasmine raised an eyebrow and removed both of Lacey's hands with one of her own. "First of all, last I checked, we're not '_besties_,' we barely know each other. Second, I think you're hurtin' the poor girl's spine, there." The taller girl tilted her head to look down at Sammy, who merely smiled weakly up at her.

"Huh?" Lacey glanced down at the thing supporting her weight, yelped in shock and immediately leapt off of Sammy like she was a springboard. Sammy quickly straightened herself and rubbed her back painfully before being subjected to a mouth shooting out words like bullets. "Oh my gosh, I am so, so, _so_ sorry! I just leaned over like that and I wasn't even thinking and I forgot you were there and that happens a _lot _of the time and I know that probably doesn't fix a possibly broken spine but it was completely by accident! You're not hurt are you?!"

Nearly overwhelmed by the sheer panic in the girl's voice (and just about on the verge of tears by the girl's overwhelming presence, although she was always like that), Sammy quickly yet quietly answered, "U-Um, no, I'm n-"

"Oh thank _GOD_." Lacey released an incredibly large breath and placed her arms on Sammy's shoulders. "Listen, most of my other first impressions don't end in pain. Or, well, sometimes they do, but the person on the receiving end of the pain gets over it later! I think. Unless I actually broke something. But not the point! The point is I'm sorry and I promise it won't ever happen again, at least never again on purpose because accidents happen and sometimes they're funny but other times they're not and actually wait a minute I don't think I know your name yet."

Completely bewildered by the amount of words coming from Lacey's mouth, it took Sammy a few extra seconds to properly respond. "Oh. ...O-Oh! I, uh... My name's Sammy."

The panicked look in Lacey's face suddenly vanished altogether, to be replaced with a look of absolute amazement. "Oh my gosh, that is _such_ a cute name! Short for Samantha?"

Sammy blinked. She hadn't used _that_ name in a long time, although it was a preferable alternative to 'Samey'. "Um, yes, it-"

"Even _cuter_!" Lacey squealed even louder, causing Sammy to wince. Next thing she knew the bubbly girl had her arms wrapped around the quiet girl's head, squeezing the life right out of her. "Oohh I can just _tell_ we're going to be the best of friends! Oh speaking of friends," she let go of Sammy's head in surprise, who took the opportunity to inhale a large gulp of air, "I need to go introduce myself to everyone else. See you guys later!"

Before Sammy could get another word in, Lacey had already strode halfway across the cabin's floor, toward the nicely-dressed boy sitting on one of the crates. The cheerleader was still in quite a state of shock after what exactly had transpired between them. She merely blinked after the girl and tried to wrap her head around it all, just as Jasmine started laughing to herself. "Oh, man, I knew that girl was a little coo-coo in the head from the moment she introduced herself."

"That was..." Sammy felt the need to say something about the experience, but didn't want to use any harmful words. It was proving difficult. "...Certainly something else."

"I'd say," Jasmine laughed again, this time accidentally letting out a snort at the end of it. "When I was in that line gettin' food earlier, Lacey accidentally took my bag and I took hers, and when we realized what happened she accused me of stealin' her donuts. 'Caused a huge fuss in the middle of the restaurant, she did, enough for security to see what was goin' on."

"Oh, goodness," Sammy looked back at Jasmine in surprise, hand over her mouth.

"Basically my reaction too, hehe. After that she sorta clinged to me for a bit, and she got to talkin' about where she was goin', and it turned out we were goin' to the exact same spot! Quite a coincidence, that."

"Y-Yeah, definitely. Um... Was that the, um, embarrassing story she didn't want you to tell?"

"Hn? Oh, no, not that. That one was where she was walkin' and talkin' at once and wasn't watchin' where she was going. She ended up bumping into this rich girl's pile of luggage and everything spilled out, and she had to pick it all up for her. There was, like, at least ten bags worth of stuff she was carryin', all knocked over just like that! Can you imagine?"

"...Oh my gosh."

"I HEARD THAT!" came the distant voice of Lacey from the other side of the cabin, much to the annoyance of the boy on the box and some of the other people around them.

Jasmine snorted again, but didn't say anything back to her. Instead, she chose to do the impossible and actually bothered to talk to Sammy. Well, impossible on the shorter girl's side at least - _no one_, hardly even her parents bothered to just casually chat with her, to see how she was doing. Jasmine was doing more than that, though, and started asking questions such as what her favorite foods and movies and books were, where she went to school and what were her best subjects and everything else in between. And the best part of it all? It was actually _incredibly _nice.

_'Is... Is this what it's like, to talk with a friend? Because if it is, I want to keep doing this. I want to talk to more people and make more friends... Then maybe I wouldn't be so miserable at home.'_

After more questions and more talking between the two, Sammy realized that a good half an hour had gone by. For the second time that hour, her face quickly fell - had she really been that engrossed in the conversation to not notice the time going by? What was Jasmine going to think about that? Was she annoyed at her for chatting her ear off? That was probably the case, since not many people enjoyed listening to her for very long... _'Just thinking about that's making me feel upset... Great...'_

Jasmine was in the middle of telling a story about how her father had been teaching her how to track kangaroos by the age of eleven, when she must have noticed Sammy's silence and distressed face and stopped her speech. "What's the matter? I'm not buggin' you, am I?"

"Huh?" Her head perked up at the question directed at her. "Oh, um, no of course not! I was just... wondering if _I_ was bothering _you_..."

Jasmine scoffed and immediately said, "Sammy, if you were botherin' me, I'd have left by now," she smiled at her. "You're not bein' a pain at all, y'know."

The words nearly made her heart leap. "I'm not?"

"No, of course not," the taller girl replied, with a big smile. "In fact I'm having a lot of fun talkin' with you. Why on earth would you be a bother, though? You're sweet n' bubbly, I don't see how anyone would get annoyed with you."

_That_ was enough to cause her face to heat up even more than earlier. She couldn't see it but she knew she was blushing. She turned towards the other direction to hide her face from Jasmine, spotting Lacey sitting down on the floor and rapidly chatting with the boy with just a bit too much hair on his face and head. "O-Oh, no, I-I don't really think..."

Jasmine's eyebrow rose even higher. "You, uh, sure you're feelin' alright, though?"

"Y-Yes! Yes of course!" Sammy replied (and half-lied), perhaps a little too quickly. "Why do you as-"

And then suddenly, out of absolutely nowhere, a flash of lightning pierced the sky. The cabin lit up from it and turned the room completely white. Thunder started rolling in shortly after, and soon the entire zeppelin began to shake violently. Debris from the ceiling even started falling down because of the rocking, one bit just barely missing Sammy's head. It looked like it would've caused a bit of damage, too... Not that she wasn't used to getting hurt, having lived with a demon for the last sixteen years, but still.

Even in the situation, Sammy still had it in her to frown at herself. 'Ugh,_ even in life-threatening situations, you're still thinking like that. Get a grip, Sparkes. Focus!'_

There were creaks and cracks sounding out as the aircraft continued to shake, and the screams coming from the others in the room were just as loud. The gruff voice that Sammy assumed was Chef Hatchet's bellowing out on top of everyone else's didn't exactly help settle things, either.

The strange thing was, though, after a few more moments of it, the storm seemed to just _vanish_. The rumbling and lightning stopped altogether and left no trace of itself behind, almost like it hadn't even happened in the first place.

Although, saying it left nothing behind would be a lie, because something _did_ show up as soon as the storm disappeared. Or rather, someone.

"Hi, newbies!" bellowed Chris McLean, Total Drama's host and apparently a master at appearing out of thin air. "Ready for some fun?!"

...

Soon, the very first challenge of the season was explained to Sammy and the others. Next to the two escape hatches in the zeppelin were crates with backpacks in them. Half of those backpacks had parachutes in them while the other half had items that apparently wouldn't help while falling from the sky.

Normally an explanation like that wouldn't be linked to a death-defying challenge and would just be regular aircraft proceedure - key word being _normally_. This was the notorious Chris McLean, after all. Anything dangerous could very well become a challenge for the others to compete in.

And this was proven the moment he hit the button on his remote, causing an explosion to manifest on one of the zeppelin's engines.

The screams returned, and everyone started running around like mad. Sammy's first thought of action was to stick as close as possible to Jasmine, seeing as how she had the most likely chance of survival and all. But just as she was about to ask her what the plan was, the Austalian got up and ran off on her own without a word.

"Wha- J-Jasmine?!" Sammy cried out to her, eyes glossed over with sheer desperation.

"Sorry, mate!" Jasmine looked over her shoulder at the smaller girl, an apologetic smile covering her face. "Every person for themselves!"

Sammy's jaw dropped slightly. The one person who would guarantee her safety was leaving her, and she was powerless to stop her. She couldn't help but give a hefty sigh despite the panic around her. _'Great, I'm _still_ being ditched in the middle of a dangerous situation. Just wonderful.'_

However, despite her sarcastic thoughts, she figured that she shouldn't hold it againt Jasmine - anyone would think of their own safety first before anyone else's when put under pressure, something Sammy knew all too well.

She shook her head to rid herself of the unhelpful thoughts - the aircraft was going down and she did _not_ want to be on it when it crashed. Although it pained her to have to leave her bags in the storage room (she thankfully made the right decision in not bringing anything too important with her), Sammy nonetheless dashed over to the closest crate and took one of the remaining backpacks from it.

She had never tried skydiving before, mainly out of fear that Amy might tamper with her parachute, so she wasn't one hundred percent sure what a backpack filled with a parachute even felt or weighed like. But, like so many other things it didn't matter at the moment. She had to take the risk of it being a dud and get to safety. Although if it _is_ a dud and she's falling over ground... well, 'safe' wouldn't be the ideal word for that situation.

Regardless, Sammy ignored the horrendous thoughts and ran to the door. Without a second thought she leapt from the exit's frame and fell through the sky with the others.

Heart racing, barely able to breathe because of the strong wind slapping at her face, Sammy decided to waste no time and desperately reached for the string attached to her pack's strap. She was _just_ about to pull on it and let fate take its course, when a voice piped up from her side.

"Heeeey! Sammy!" She looked to her left to see Lacey spinning around in the air, a look of pure exhilaration in her eyes. "Isn't this _amazing?!_ I've never gone skydiving before but I know I'll want to do it again some day!"

"What?! Are you crazy?!" Sammy screamed at her - or almost did, she thought. It was hard to even hear her own voice against the raging wind. "T-This is terrifying!"

"You just haven't been out of the house enough! Live a little!" Lacey called back, halting herself when she was completely upside-down. Unfortunately for Sammy, she also had a good vantage point for the place where eyes were _not_ meant to go. "Man, they went all out on the uniform, didn't they? It's _all_ red!"

Sammy wailed in surprise and turned the exact same shade of her outfit, quickly holding down the flapping cloth against her legs. _'Okay _now_ I'm regretting not grabbing my bag! Why the heck did I decide to wear a skirt today?!'_

Lacey seemed to be taking the cheerleader's reaction quite well, however. "No need to be so wound up, I'm kidding! Well besides the fact that it _is_ all red, but red looks nice on you! Although I can _totally_ see you in blue, too!"

"C-Can we stop talking about this, please?!" Sammy shrieked. "I'd like to focus on not dying!"

"Ah, right, right, the challenge! Say no more, madam, I'll leave you alone!" Lacey up-righted herself and performed an almost perfect mid-air salute, before taking a diving position and forcing herself to go faster toward the ocean. "See you on the islaaaaand!"

When Lacey was a fair distance away, Sammy released a large breath in relief. That girl was just _too_ energetic for her liking. Just talking to her wore her out, and the fact that she was free-falling didn't much help... Oh, right. Speaking of which.

Sammy, still holding onto the drawstring on her pack, hastily pulled it and instantly felt her insides attempt to force their way out of her gut. The parachute that was thankfully in her pack slowed her fall by an incredible amount, and soon she had herself balanced and gently floating downwards. Despite the complete terror that Sammy had just bore witness to, she couldn't help but become instantly mesmerized by the view.

The island that they were going to be on was a fair distance away from the mainland, so much so that no matter which direction Sammy looked in, all she could see was clear, blue water with the occasional smaller island spotting it. It was absolutely breath-taking, like she was just waking up from sleeping on a cloud to the beautiful glow of the mid-morning sun. If she could just defy gravity long enough to stay there and take in the view for another little while longer, she most certainly would without hesitation...

The immersion was broken, unfortunately, when Chef Hatchet himself plummeted in her line of sight, screaming his head off.

Sammy blinked and watched his descent, wincing as he eventually made a splash in the ocean. Despite enjoying the comfort that she so rarely ever felt, his fall was a welcome interruption - she had to focus on maneuvering herself onto a safe spot of the island, after all. With little tugs to the parachute handles, and a little patience on her end (one of the very few things she prided herself in, really), Sammy was finally coming in on the beach after a few more minutes of floating.

She braced herself for impact, but she actually managed to land somewhat easily despite her lack of parachuting experience. Opening both eyes and looking around to make sure that, yes, she _was_ on the island in one piece and not on her way to the afterlife, Sammy allowed a large grin to take over her face. "OMG... I-I did it...!" she said aloud, more to herself than to anyone else. But still, the meaning was the same: she really _had_ done it! The landing probably could've been better (perhaps on her feet instead of her knees), but she wasn't going to complain! For someone who had never done anything like that before, she had no right to! _'I'd love to see Amy's face right about now...!'_

She quickly stood up and unhooked her pack and started jogging over to where Chris was standing, tripping a little in her excitement but regaining her balance before she made a fool of herself. When she was about halfway to the host, however, she stopped to realize something that just didn't add up. "...Wait a sec... Wasn't he just on the zeppelin...? I know I passed him when I jumped, so how'd he get here so fast?"

"_That_, girlie, was a hologram," the gruff voice from the zeppelin's intercom said to the right of her. Sammy jumped slightly when Chef Hatchet, garbed in pilot's gear and soaked from head to toe, emerged from the sea and walked up along side her with an angered look on his face. "And I'm about to find out why he just left me to _die_ like that."

"Left you to..." Sammy got shivers just from saying that. "T-That was really mean of him. Although I could probably relate..."

"You ever been left for dead in a burnin' zeppelin by the person you call your 'partner'?" Chef eyed her dangerously.

That look gave Sammy the chills and a new batch of stomach-butterflies, but she answered truthfully nonetheless. "In a sense... y-yes." Well, it was more like being stuck up in a tree and ditched, or having your knee skinned out after falling off your bike and ditched, or even locked in a room with an angry rabid dog and ditched... Either way, they were pretty darn close.

Chef blinked at her answer, and then after what seemed like an eternity later quietly placed his arm on her shoulder and shook his head. "That just ain't right." And as soon as that was said he walked away.

Sammy simply stared after him. "O... kay...? Thanks...?" She blinked when she considered his words. "...And, wait, did he mean his 'partner' as in 'partner in crime', or-?"

Suddenly there was a high-pitched and much louder voice immediately behind her. "_WOOOO!_ That was _EPIC!_" Lacey was suddenly in the exact same spot Chef had previously been in, and she too was drenched in sea water. "Aww, man, I am _so_ going skydiving again when I get back home!" Lacey turned and seemed to notice Sammy standing next to her for the first time. "Oh, hey Red! Looks like you made it down safe and sound!"

Sammy's cheeks flared once again and she instinctively grabbed the hem her skirt. "Please, _please_ don't call me that! Just, forget you saw anything, please!"

"Haha okay, okay, I got it!" Lacey held up her hands defensively and chuckled nervously. "Erasing the image from my memory! But on a more serious note - you enjoyed it, right? The skydiving? It was fun right? More fun than you've ever had before? Don't tell me it wasn't, cuz then you'd be lying and lying is baaaad."

Sammy crossed her arms and pouted slightly. This girl went from talking about underwear colors to skydiving in less than a second. It was kind of hard to keep up with her... "I-It was fun actually, I guess. Not the diving part but, like, after the parachute opened up and I was just... _floating_ there... It was really pretty... T-The view, I mean, I guess..."

"I knew it, I knew it!" Lacey cheered, accidentally splashing the water on her arms on Sammy's face. If the redhead noticed, though, she made no mention of it. "You liked it! I knew you'd like it! Ohhh man, falling through the sky at the speed of sound is just the best!"

Sammy wiped the water from her face and tried to smile at the girl. "Um, I don't think we were-"

Lacey seemed to not notice her speak. "Ooh, but actually, that part about just floating there and taking in the view sounds nice too! I should try _that_ when I go again back home!"

Sammy rubbed the back of her head and nervously giggled. "You, uh, might want to make sure you have a parachute next time, if that's the case..."

"Hm?" Lacey looked back at her. "Whaddaya mean?"

Sammy blinked. "Oh, um... y-you fell in the water, right? That means you pulled the string and didn't have a parachu-"

All of a sudden Lacey smacked herself on the forehead, a movement so swift that Sammy actually flinched away from it. "Dangit! I _knew_ I forgot something!" Lacey grabbed the string on her pack's strapped and pulled it. Suddenly, another parachute burst out of it and gently drifted to the ground. "A_ha!_ Looks like I had one after all! Funny how that turned out, don't'cha think?"

Sammy could only continue to stare and blink at both the grinning girl and the collapsed parachute in utter disbelief. _'She... didn't even pull her string? She just willingly fell into the ocean? What on earth is _wrong_ with this girl?!'_

...

A/N: Okay, well, that about sums up the first chapter. Thanks to you all who read the prologue and chose to stick around! It means a lot!

I should make a couple of things clear, first of all: as mentioned in the description, the OC Lacey will indeed be a character in the story, and while she will be featured somewhat heavily, she is definitely _not_ the protagonist - that title belongs to Sammy, obviously.

Secondly, the story is going to be sticking somewhat close to the first few episodes of Pahkitew Island, seeing as how the actual plot doesn't kick in until a few episodes later. Of course, because of the lack of a certain character and the introduction of another one, some things _will_ be different, whether they be minor or incredibly important.

Thirdly, the major characters of the story are the three that were introduced in the chapter. Unfortunately, some characters who ended up decently ahead of everyone else may also end up being one of the first to be eliminated. It really depends on how the story unfolds, honestly.

And finally, at the start of every new day for Sammy, I'm planning on having this little segment before that chapter actually begins that highlights a point in her life that coincidentally relates to the challenge of that day (or is at least plot-specific). They're not tied to the chapter itself and will just be there to give you guys a better understanding of Sammy's and Amy's relationship (and trust me, it may not be pretty).

PHEW! That's a lot of ground to cover. If you bothered to read all that, good for you! Either way, feel free to leave reviews, criticisms, tips relating to the characters, whatever! I want to make sure that I can make this story come out well, and I'll need your help to do it! So thanks again for reading, and I'll see you next time! :D


	3. It's A Dirty Job

About fifteen minutes after everyone had landed, Sammy and the others were ushered into a wider section of the beach for a better group shot (in all of the excitement, Sammy legitimately forgot that she was on a reality show). Once at the meeting spot, and after waiting a few minutes for one of the guys to find their way back to the beach, the fourteen teenagers were divided into two teams, based on whether or not they had parachutes in their packs.

God must have been letting her catch a break, since both Jasmine _and_ Lacey ended up on her team, the two people out of everyone she was able to call her 'close-acquaintances-but-not-really-proper-friends-yet'. She had no idea how she'd fare on a team with six complete strangers, so she was immensely thankful that that wasn't the case.

Of course, that wasn't to say that the other four members of the team were unimportant; Rodney definitely had the build to help with the more physical parts of challenges, and Scarlett was probably smart enough to think up almost any plan that would guarantee victory. Max and Topher... well, she was sure they had a useful talent to offer. She just wasn't sure what it was.

And judging from the other team's members, it seemed like her team had the advantage over them - not that she was insulting them or anything! Sammy was sure they were good people, it was just, well... a boy who actually believed he was a wizard, a girl dressed as a princess who did nothing but sing, and a guy who only talked through sound effects... those things probably wouldn't be suited for a team-driven game. Nevertheless, they were their own people with their own tastes and hobbies. Who was she to judge? Especially considering how often she _herself_ had been judged growing up... But again, that didn't matter.

As Chris finished roll-call for her team and yelled out her name - her _actual_ name, thank God, not that atrocious nickname - to the cameras, Sammy released a breath she hadn't realized she'd been holding. She should've known that Amy's influence was completely absent here, and no one would have a reason to call her 'Samey' while she was competing. Of course, having come to expect everyone to call her that name had become second nature to her. Thankfully, it didn't seem to be the case here. _'This entire thing is almost too good to be true. I hope I'm not just dreaming this.'_

Ignoring the fact that she was totally unable to pronounce her team's name (Sammy particularly didn't care much for it anyways), Chris went on to describe the rest of the challenge - to build a shelter for their stay on the island, mainly because there _wasn't _any shelter for them. Sammy, who had never built anything outside of a birdhouse for a school project, was understandably nervous.

"We have to build... an entire shelter?" she asked aloud as Chris walked away. "Like an actual, house sort of thing? That sounds kinda tough..."

"Hey, don't sweat it!" Lacey suddenly shouted, eliciting a wince from Sammy. "We've got an ace up our sleeve: an _actual_ survivalist who knows how to do _actual_ survivalist stuff!" She pointed towards Jasmine, who was making her way towards the two. "This challenge is _totally_ in the bag!"

"Hold your horses there, girlie," Jasmine hushed her as she approached. "I've only ever made shelters for m'self growing up. Ain't made one for more than one person, let alone seven of us. It might be a bit more work than what I'm used to." A smile crept its way onto her lips nonetheless. "But yeah, we should be just fine. If you all follow my instructions that is."

Sammy looked at the taller girl in bafflement. "Wait, your instru-" she tried to say, before she was interrupted.

"_HEY!_ Fart monster!" Chris's loud voice bellowed over everyone else. "Yeah, I was _talking!_"

"'Fart monster'?" Lacey asked as she hastily glanced at both girls besides her. "I-It wasn't me, I swear. Not this time at least."

Sammy gave her a questioning look, to which Lacey giggled nervously and shrugged. Choosing to ignore it for now, she and the rest of the group walked the short distance to where Chris was currently situated: on top of a large pile of trash, surrounded by other large piles of trash. The area could easily be identified as a garbage dump, surprising for their current location. _'And it smells _awful_,'_ Sammy thought disgustedly.

"Each team may take supplies from the common area before they begin to build," Chris explained from atop his pile. "_But_, these supplies are guarded by Chef, armed with a powerful tennis ball blaster." He gestured towards a large rock not too far away from the contestants, where Chef was grinning madly at them with a... tennis ball-loaded mini-gun? _'Is... is that thing even legal?!'_

Chris jumped from the pile, landing smoothly right in front of them. "A glancing blow will sting," he told them, with Chef demonstrating by shooting a ball directly at Dave's forehead. He screamed upon contact, but then awkwardly shrugged it off. "And a direct hit, can take you right to the ground." Chef next demonstrated by... shooting a ball at Max, right in the... the, um... the unmentionables. Sammy cringed as he flew to the ground and groaned in pain. She was _glad_ she wasn't in his position.

After Rodney attempted to set Max back on his feet (and failing), Chris continued on. "Team Muss-kwuk will build their shelter further inland. Team Gi-no-say-wak, towards the beach. Best shelter - according to _me_ - wins the challenge." And with that, he hauled out his airhorn and sounded it out. "Begin!"

As soon as the words left his mouth, Chef started firing the mini-gun at random, causing a hail of tennis balls to zoom towards everyone. Sammy ducked and dodged as many as she could, which surprisingly included all of the ones aimed at her. Despite a few grazing her arms, she came out of it relatively unscathed.

"Move, Salmons!" Jasmine suddenly cried out, directing everyone on their team to follow her. She led them towards a few conveniently placed bushes and a tree stump, far enough away to stay out of Chef's range but also close enough to find supplies easier. To be able to instantly find a spot like that under pressure was impressive; Jasmine definitely deserved that 'survivalist' title.

The moment everyone was in the clear, Jasmine tried to lay out a plan for all of them, but was continuously being interrupted by Rodney attempting to do the same as she did so.

"Here's the pla-"

"Listen up, we-"

They stopped and looked at each other in puzzled looks.

"Some of us should-"

"We each grab-"

Their faces contorted even more.

"Can you just listen for a second?"

"What do you think you're doing?"

"Oh, yeah, bickering like an old married couple is _definitely_ gonna help us win," Lacey mumbled sarcastically to herself. Silently, Sammy had to agree. This was a team game after all, meaning they had to _work_ as a team. And since all teams needed leaders, that meant choosing someone _as_ the leader. Her vote was for Jasmine, obviously. And it looked like Jasmine herself felt the same way.

The taller girl grabbed Rodney's overall straps and moved his face closer to hers. "Just listen to the plan. We need to decide what items are important and make sure we get 'em. Got it?" When Rodney didn't answer right away, she went on to detail more of that plan. "We'll go in groups of two or three to get the things we need, then we'll double back and bring 'em behind here. We do this enough times to make sure we got everythin', and then we'll go to build that shelter elsewhere. ...And that's the plan. Cool?"

_'Is this what she meant by her instructions?'_ Sammy wondered as Jasmine waited for a response. _'I guess she was already planning on taking the role as a leader from the beginning, then. Good call, not really sure if anyone else on the team could manage that. ...Agh, maybe that was a bit too mean...'_

As everyone waited for a response from Rodney, Sammy realized something. He hadn't spoken since their little quarrel. In fact, it didn't look like he had moved in the least. Or even _looked_ anywhere besides directly at Jasmine. He just kept... staring at her. Without saying a word. It was kind of creepy, to say the least.

And all of a sudden he _did_ speak again. And in a really... _really_ awkward way. "With a plan that... flowers... you... you and sunsets art not true..." And then he made... kissing motions towards Jasmine?

Jasmine, Sammy, and probably everyone else reeled back at that sight. This was getting weird. _'O... Okay... Um... I guess he's... the all-brawn, no-brain type? Ugh, no, that was too mean too...'_

In the end, Jasmine decided the best remedy was to slap him _hard_ across the face. "Get a hold of yourself, man! Focus!" He shook his head from the recoil and quietly mumbled an apology. Jasmine merely rolled her eyes and turned back to the common area. "Okay, all, listen up. The wood is the most important thing out there, so-" On the other side of the stump, Scarlett slowly raised her hand. "If you have somethin' to say, Scarlett, just bark it out."

Scarlett shyly rubbed the back of her head. "Um... no... But, the wheelbarrow _is_ more important than the wood because, it's a class-two lever, and with the wheel acting as a fulcrum, you can-"

Sammy shot her head up, quickly scanned the common area for the wheelbarrow Scarlett mentioned and, upon finding it, quickly produced an idea. "We can carry stuff in it!" she said aloud, instantly feeling bad for interrupting Scarlett but nonetheless anxious to get her plan out. Normally, this would be the point where Sammy would curl up in on herself thanks to her outburst and subsequent drawing of everyone's attention, but she desperately forced her face to remain neutral.

"_Nice_ idea, Sammy! Good work!" Jasmine called out to her.

...And of course, _those_ were the words that made her falter.

She instantly felt her face erupt. '_Nice idea, Sammy?_' When was the last time she had heard _that_? Every single time she'd have a good idea or plan, Amy would always, _always_ claim that she came up with it and get all the credit for it. It didn't matter how small it was, she would _always_ steal it for herself.

So Jasmine congratulating her on it came as an absolute shock to Sammy. Did the plan even deserve a pat on the back? It wasn't even that _good_ of an idea, just that they could use the wheelbarrow to carry the wood and stuff, anyone could have thought of that. Heck, even a _child_ could have come up with something better than th-

"Sammy? Hey, earth to Sammy!"

She immediately jolted out of her thoughts and turned towards Jasmine. "H-Huh? What?"

The taller girl was looking at her in concern. "Were you listenin' to anythin' I just said? You looked like you were in a daze of some sort."

Sammy's cheeks turned into an even darker shade of red at her words. Had Jasmine continued giving instructions? Wait, what was she thinking, _of course_ she had been. It's just that Sammy was too wound up in her own thoughts to bother to listen to her. _'Idiot... Idiot! You're just as bad as Amy says. Pay more attention, damn it!'_

Out loud, however, her breathing sped up considerably and she ended up unfortunately stumbling over her words. "N-No, I. wasn't... Wait, I mean, yes, I-I guess... Ohhh, oh gosh, I-I'm so sorry, I didn't mean to, I'll listen from now on I swear, I'm so sor-"

"Easy! Easy now!" Jasmine said in a reassuring manner. She placed a gentle hand on her shoulder, and Sammy tried to ignore how it basically engulfed the entirety of it. "You didn't do anything wrong, okay? No harm done. I just need you to _calm down_. Can you do that?"

Sammy hastily nodded her head and tried to slow her breathing. An outburst like that was something she was trying to _avoid_. That plan definitely failed... "O-Okay, I'm okay now... Sorry... Again. W-What was the plan?"

Jasmine smiled and pointed a thumb towards the common area, specifically at the wheelbarrow out in the open. "I want you and Rodney to take the wheelbarrow and use it to gather any wood you find around there. It might get a bit heavy carryin' it, so Sammy, you guard the wheelbarrow from the others, and Rodney will go get the wood on his own and bring it back. Easy." She turned back to the shorter girl with a smile. "Think you can do it?

Sammy nodded. "Y-Yes, I think so." And she meant it, too. All she had to do was guard the wheelbarrow and avoid Chef's shots, right? That, she could definitely do.

...Maybe.

"Good! Then get to it!" Jasmine said cheerfully, motioning to Rodney for him to go as well.

Although Rodney himself was a bit... distracted. "Heavy is my heart... carrying of-"

"Oh for Pete's sake, just stop talking and _go_ already, you oaf!" Lacey shouted at him, standing from her crouched position and pushing him out towards the open field. This also caused him to trip over the tree stump and fall flat on his face. Ignoring him his yelp of pain, she turned to Sammy and bumped her on the shoulder. "You can _do _this, girl! Show 'em what you're made of!"

With another semi-confident nod and a quick "Thank you", Sammy hopped over the stump, helped Rodney stand, and rushed over to the wheelbarrow, ducking and dodging any balls launched her way. When she made it to the cart she quickly disappeared behind it in order to save herself from Chef Hatchet's tennis ball wrath. _'And to think, I thought he was actually going to be nice to me... Another person to add to that... that incredibly long list... _Darn it_, Sammy, not the time! Concentrate!'_

Glancing over to her left (and ignoring the sickening _thud_ that the fired balls were making on the other side of the wheelbarrow), Sammy watched as Rodney reached one of the many piles of trash. He bent over and swiftly picked up a _huge_ pile of wood in his hands before rushing back over to the wheelbarrow, plopping the pile into it and running towards the hiding spot. Sammy, realizing that her shield was now on the move, quickly followed Rodney, all the while under fire from, once again, the man with the mini-gun.

It was futile for such a big teen to dodge any of them, though. Rodney ended up taking the brunt of the balls, plenty of which were aimed for his head, but luckily it didn't look like any of them fazed him. And while she wasn't too proud of it, he _was_ good at accidentally blocking the ones aimed for her... She'd have to thank him for it later. But, hang on, if it meant he'd get all weird on her like he did for Jasmine... then maybe she should just stay away from him.

The tennis balls stopped flying after a few more seconds of running (_'Chef must've found a new target'_) and the duo quickened their pace back to the hiding spot. When they got there, Sammy noticed that only two people - Scarlett and Max - remained, the former looking around for anything useful to grab, and the latter doing absolutely nothing.

"Where'd the others go?" Rodney asked Scarlett as they dumped their wood behind the stump.

"Oh, um, Jasmine left first. Said she was going to retrieve the rope," Scarlett said, pointing off in the distance to where Jasmine was indeed grabbing some rope. "Lacey left after her. She said she was, and I quote, 'going to find something unique that no one else would find.' She ran behind that garbage pile over there... I haven't seen her since. And as for Topher..."

Scarlett pointed behind Sammy and Rodney, and, following her direction, they spotted Topher up on the same ledge as Chef was, excitedly talking with Chris.

Rodney stared in disbelief. "_Really_? We're halfway through the first challenge and he decides to go talk to Chris instead of help us out I mean, _really_?" He turned back and looked down at Sammy. "C'mon, we're going out there again and this time we're gonna bring back _double_ to make up for it." He grabbed the handles of the wheelbarrow and charged out of the hiding spot once again. "_For Jasmiiiiiine!_"

Sammy stared at his back as he made his way towards another one of the piles of trash. She gave Scarlett a confused look, to which the other girl only shrugged. Again, Sammy ignored Rodney's... _quirks_, and opted to just follow the boy without a word.

She eventually caught up to him, and started picking up some of the discarded pieces of wood scattered around the general area. After a while, she had a small but respectable pile in her hands, enough for her to load into the wheelbarrow. As she was moving to put them in, her foot hit something small but loud. Not necessarily hard, but it was enough to make her jump.

She glanced down to see a box of nails next to her boot. It had been overturned when she made contact with it, and its contents were scattered across the ground around her.

The sight of the nails caused her to realize something: how exactly were they going to keep these pieces of board together? With just rope? That wouldn't do, they needed something that guaranteed the boards would stick together. Conveniently, something like a bunch of nails.

She unloaded her pile of wood into the wheelbarrow and quickly gathered the nails around her feet. Of course, nails on their own wouldn't be any good - they'd need something to hammer them in. She scanned the immediate area for anything solid and heavy that would be suitable for hitting, and quickly found some small rocks not too far from her current location. Maybe she'd also be able to find some sturdy sticks, too, and they could use Jasmine's rope to tie them together and-

"Hey, what are you doing? Hurry it up!" Rodney's yelling had called her back to reality.

Sammy shook her head, chastising herself for getting distracted _again_, and followed the larger boy back to their hiding spot. She'd go back for the rocks later, after they dumped their current load.

Jasmine had already returned when they arrived, with Topher just crouching down behind the bushes the moment they did. Scarlett and Max were also still there. "Did ya find anythin' good?" Jasmine asked the two, the long rope slung around her shoulder.

"Wood...Got lots... wood... Hahaha..." was Rodney's _still_ odd reply.

Jasmine eyed him with annoyance. "Look, Rodney, why don't ya just go and get more of it, yeah? We need all we can get."

"Y-Yes, ma'am!" Rodney bellowed. He grabbed the wheelbarrow again and plowed right by everyone.

Jasmine shook her head at him. "I'm really not understandin' farm boy over there." She turned back to Sammy and gave another pleasant smile. "Well? Wha'd'ja get?"

"Oh, um, like he... er, 'said', we managed to find a lot of wood," Sammy replied, gesturing to the large pile forming behind them. "Also, I was wondering, um..."

"Hm? What's up?" Jasmine asked.

Sammy gulped. She prayed that the answer to her question wasn't so obvious that she'd be making a fool of herself... "H-How were we thinking of making the boards stick together...?"

"_Stick_ together?" Jasmine looked up as if considering it for the first time. "Mm, well, my shelters were really suitable for one person over a single night, so I wasn't really worried about stability then... But with this many people and for more than one night, we may need somethin' better." She looked back down. "Ahh, if we want them to _stick _together we'd probably use, say, glue or something. That sound cool?"

Oh. Glue, huh? Was that better than nails? Probably, probably not. Sammy didn't really know. Still, she should bring the nails up anyway. "O-Oh, I see," she replied. "Would that be... the best option? 'Cuz I found this box of nails over there, and-"

"Nails? Lemme see." Jasmine took the box that Sammy offered and inspected it, before taking one of the nails out and inspecting that one too. "Huh, these are actually in pretty good shape. We may actually be able to use these, if we find some hammers as well. Nicely done, Sammy!"

"O-Oh, gosh... t-thanks..." Sammy stammered, scratching the back of her neck and giggling embarrassedly. _'If this keeps up, my cheeks are gonna catch on fire...'_

"Now, we just need to find good hammers and we'd be set," Jasmine murmured, taking another quick scan over the common area. "Got any idea where they might be, guys?"

"The probability of any being underneath any of these garbage piles is exceptionally high," Scarlett said quietly, also looking at the area. "There's... also a _chance_ that there may not even be any hammers in the first place. Perhaps we could fashion some using some of that rope you procured."

"Huh, that just might work," Jasmine replied to her. "Some rocks and tree branches should work, I think."

"Um," Sammy spoke up, drawing the two girl's eyes over to her. "I found some stones eariler, too. They looked pretty good, at least I think they did..."

Jasmine grinned. "Perfect. Great job, guys, we're on a roll with this! Okay, you remember where those stones are?"

"Mhm."

"Awesome! We don't want 'em to be too heavy since they'd probably make the branches we find break, but just bring as many as you can. Think you can do it?"

"I... I think I'll be able to... Hopefully."

"You've been doin' a good job with the wood so far, the rocks should be a cinch for you!"

"W-Well, maybe... Most of it was Rodney, tho-"

"_Innncomiiiiiiiing!_"

Everyone's heads snapped towards the common area in time to witness a _mountain_ of blankets and pillows barrelling towards the hiding spot. It was moving fast, and Sammy only had just enough time to back out of the way of it as it tripped over the tree stump and wasted itself all over the ground.

Lacey, who had been the moving pile the entire time, skidded across the dirt with her legs comically thrown up into the air. The blankets and pillows that had been in her arms were now all over the ground, one quilt having also landed on Max somehow (who also ended up on the ground while attempting to get it off him. Everyone ignored him though).

Lacey came to a stop a few feet from everyone, her legs plopping down onto the ground shortly after. "Ughh," she moaned, her voice muffled from her face being planted into the ground. She raised her head up and started spitting out mud from her mouth. "Argh, I hate hate _haaate_ the taste of dirt. I need to rinse my mouth later..." Nonetheless, she whirled around onto her back and forced herself up. "Oh, right. Hi guys! I found blankets and pillows for us to use! They're, ahh, kinda stinky so we _may_ want to wash them first, but otherwise they're in great shape! Don't know _why_ anyone would throw 'em away like that..."

Jasmine bent down and picked up one that had landed by her feet. She examined it from top to bottom, probably looking for any stitches coming loose. After she did that she actually sniffed it, and pulled her head back in disgust. "Yyyyeah, that's definitely a bad smell. Nothin' a little river water couldn't fix though. Nice find, Lace."

Lacey grinned at the taller girl and did a little bow. "Why, thank you! I do try my best, after all. And check it out-" she gestured to the scattered quilts. "I managed to get enough for all seven of us! Although I'm _pretty_ sure they're too small for you, Jasmine."

She pouted at Lacey, apparently not too fond of that last comment, but ended up shrugging it off. "Eh, probably doesn't matter anyways. Depending on how much we have, I may not need one anyway."

"Oh? And why's that?" Lacey questioned with a tilt to her head.

"I'd probably just sleep outside or somethin', no big deal. I'm more used to the wilderness than in a shelter anyway."

"Really? Huh." Lacey glanced back down to her collected items and puffed her lips in thought. "Dang. Maybe I should'a left another one of these with Beardo then..."

At those words, Sammy could've sworn she felt the temperature drop a few degrees. She... gave some of the blankets and pillows to the other team? That was definitely not a good idea in this situation. Helping the other team shouldn't even be on the priority list.

And it seemed like Jasmine felt the same way. She wore a bewildered expression as Lacey continued to think to herself. "W-Wait, wait wait wait. Lacey, say that again."

The redhead looked back up at Jasmine and grinned. "That again!"

Jasmine's face fell into a menacing glare towards her, almost on par with her sister's own scowl. Looked like when Jasmine got mad, she got _mad_.

Lacey's own face fell when there was no humorous comeback. "Oh. Not the time for jokes. Gotcha." She awkwardly cleared her throat. "I, er, found like a _huge_ pile of blankets and pillows on the other side of the dump. I saw them and I was like, 'Hey, we'll probably need these, we don't want to be freezing our butts off if it gets cold at night!' So I grabbed them all and was about to come back, but then I saw Beardo nearby, and it looked like he was still recovering from when he got hit in the sweet spot by Chef."

"S-Sweet spot?" Sammy asked in horror.

"Yeahh, sweet spot," Lacey nodded sagely. "Seemed pretty bad too. I couldn't do anything to help, but then I thought, 'Hey, those guys are probably gonna need blankets and pillows too!' So I counted what was in my hands, made sure I still had seven sets with me, although I guess I really only needed six, and then gave the rest to him before running back here. It was probably like... four or five blankets and three pillows that I gave him. He seemed pretty cool about it! Well, I think. He didn't say anything. Although that applause sound he made might've meant something..."

"Okay, that wasn't exactly 'saying that again,'" Jasmine sighed to herself. "But let me get this straight: you _helped_ the other team. In a competition where we're trying to _beat_ the other team."

For one of the first time since the zeppelin, Lacey _actually_ seemed to be at a loss for words. "W-Well... Yeah, I... guess that sounds about rght."

Jasmine pinched the bridge of her nose and groaned. "Lacey, the point of this show is to _win._ You don't _win_ by helping out the enemies! Who knows, maybe because you gave those things to Beardo, his team might be able to get the win over us! Did you even think of that?"

Lacey nervously glanced to the side and started spinning a lock of her hair. "Er, well, I guess I didn't. But like, he was just sitting there in pain, and it didn't look like he had managed to grab anything for his team! I couldn't just leave him there!"

"The fact that he didn't have anything is _exactly_ why you should've left him there!" Jasmine countered, raising her voice significantly louder. "Helping _them_ could lead to _our _loss, which means _you'd_ be the one who'd get eliminated. _Got it?_"

"Well, who died and made_ you_ team captain, huh?!" Lacey shouted right back, hands on her hips and an uncharacteristically hard look settling onto her face. "Last I checked, we didn't even decide who'd _be_ team captain! And besides, they're _blankets and pillows! _What are they gonna do with them that'd cost us the victory? Put them up as curtains in the windows? Like _that_ would score them extra points!"

Their arguing continued for what felt like an eternity. Sammy, too afraid to do anything, desperately turned to the others for assistance. Unfortunately, it looked like everyone else had either already left or just wasn't paying attention. Rodney had yet to come back, and Scarlett and Max had disappeared without a word. Topher, on the other hand, was too busy combing his hair to even bother with the argument.

_'Oh crap... Not good, not good! H-How am I gonna stop their fight?! We don't-'_ Sammy quickly glanced up towards the rock Chris and Chef were situated on. Chris seemed to be looking at his watch, a possible indicator that time was almost up. _'We don't have much time left! They need to get back to work! But how?! What do I do?!'_

Jasmine and Lacey _still_ had not let up. In fact, they were edging closer to one another as they shouted, almost like they'd go for each other's throats if they reached each other. Sammy needed to do something, anything, to get their minds focused and back into the game. She really didn't want to, mainly because drawing their wrath would be _bad_, but she _had_ to do it.

And so she did.

"G-_GUYS! Stop fighting! We'll run out of time!_"

As the words exploded out of Sammy, the girls' fight suddenly stopped, just as they reached the other. Their heads swung around towards Sammy in bafflement, and Lacey's mouth hung open from the terrible words she was just about to produce.

Sammy, for perhaps the millionth time in her life, felt herself curl up. She instinctually grabbed her left arm and rubbed it awkwardly, a nervous habit she had developed from all those years of living with a terror of a twin sister. "...P-Please...?" she squeaked timidly, her previous volume deserting her.

Jasmine was the first to snap out of it. She shook her head hard enough for her hat to become lopsided. "R-Right. The challenge. Forgot about that for a second, hehe," she laughed nervously, absent-mindedly fixing her hat. She turned to the still stunned Lacey. "So, um, yeah, sorry about snappin' like that. No hard feelin's?" She smiled awkwardly at her and extended a hand for shaking.

Lacey slowly shifted her gaze from the still apprehensive Sammy towards the now apologetic Jasmine, still unsure of what was happening. Hesitantly she took Jasmine's hand in her own and shook it. "Y-Yeah. No hard feelings."

Jasmine's stilted smile became genuine and she eagerly shook Lacey's hand. A bit _too_ eagerly, Sammy noticed; it almost looked like Lacey's arm might pop out of its socket. "Great! Now, let's hurry and try to get more things before times up, yeah? Don't want to get behind on our first day!"

"R-Right, sounds good," Lacey said. She drew in a big breath and shook her head, causing her many necklaces to flail around in the process. "Right! We've got work to do! Can't be caught off guard, no sir!" She grabbed Sammy's right hand and started running out towards the common area. "C'mon, we gotta find something good, let's go!"

"W-Wha-?!" Sammy, _completely_ unprepared for the sudden force of being pulled, nearly tripped over her own two feet as Lacey dragged her across the open area. Thankfully that didn't happen, and soon they reached one of the closest piles of trash.

It seemed like every other person must've realized that time was slowly ticking away as well, since it looked like nearly everyone was out in the piles rummaging through the garbage. Sammy glanced back behind her to the hiding spot, where Jasmine was just leaping out from behind and running off towards another spot on the field.

_'Gosh, I hope that fight doesn't make the two of them hate each other now... I'd _really_ not want the two closest people I have here to suddenly despise one another. It'd make so much so difficult...'_

"Okay!" Lacey shouted, forcing a startled high-pitched squeal out of Sammy's throat. "What are we loking for again?"

"Oh!" Sammy quickly thought back to the conversation _before_ the fight. "W-We were thinking of getting hammers for the nails I found. There probably aren't any good ones here, s-so Scarlett suggested using Jasmine's rope to make our own out of rocks and sticks."

"Perfect! Where can we find the rocks, though?" Lacey glanced at the mountains of garbage surrounding them. "They better not be under these piles, I am _not_ going dumpster diving again!"

Sammy fought back the urge to gag at the other girl's sentence. "You've gone _dumpster diving_?"

"Yeahh, long story, that," Lacey rubbed her neck in embarrasment. "But not important right now! We need those rocks!"

"Ahh, right, r-right!" Sammy quickly looked around at the massive mountains. She spotted the one particular hill where she had seen the stones beforehand, and quickly pointed in that direction. "T-They're over there! I see them, at the very bottom of the pile!"

Lacey followed her hand and shouted in joy when she saw them. "_Excellent!_ Let's go, let's go!" She grabbed Sammy's hand once again, the cheerleader this time somewhat more prepared for it, and rushed directly over to them, ignoring Chef's barrage of balls headed their way (and actually outrunning most of them. Sammy noted that Lacey was _fast_).

They reached the base of the pile quickly, and the two of them immediately dove to their knees and started gathering the rocks. "These look great, y'know!" Lacey cried as she inspected a nice round one. "Perfect for making hammers out of! You've really got an eye for this!"

"W-What?" Sammy stammered at the compliment, nearly dropping some of the stones she had collected. "N-No, not really, I mean they were just... _there_, you know? Anyone could've seen them."

"Well, yeah, sure, but you saw them first, didn't you?" Lacey asked without looking up. "I mean, they're still here! If anyone could've seen them they'd be gone by now, right?"

"I-I..." Sammy could definitely feel the steam coming out of her ears. It wasn't an entirely unpleasant feeling. "Yeah, I... I guess... Maybe..."

Lacey brought her head up from her collection of rocks and looked at Sammy. She still wore a smile on her face, but unlike her usual ear-to-ear grin, it was a kinder and more concerned expression. "Hey, no need to fret over it, okay? We're gonna win this, I _know_ we will!"

Sammy looked up at her and attempted her own sincere smile. "R-Right... We, we can do this." Or so she said. False confidence was better than none at all, right?

Lacey's raucous grin returned to her face. "'Atta girl!" She stood up, arms filled to the brim with stones. "Okay, we got the stones for the hammers. Now we have to go look for the-"

And out of the blue came the loud sound of Chris's airhorn. Sammy and Lacey looked towards the host as he shouted out that collecting time was over and building time was starting.

"Dang it!" Lacey grumbled, kicking one of the stones away in frustration. "Well there goes that plan. Let's hope one of the others have the sticks."

"Yeah..." Sammy agreed, rising from her kneeling position and balancing the rocks in her arms. She glanced over to her team's hiding spot, where Jasmine was already back and along with Scarlett and Max, the latter two with a wagon in tow and both groups with a large amount of wood with them. Rodney was also on his way back towards the spot, his wheelbarrow once again full and about ready to collapse from the weight of it all. Even Topher had bothered to run out and grab something, even though a broken hand mirror probably wouldn't be much help...

Lacey nudged Sammy in the shoulder and gestured her to follow. They set out for the hiding spot, Sammy desperately trying not to drop that _one_ rock that was slowly slipping out of her grip. She already had a semi-meltdown earlier, she did _not_ need to mess up the task that was requested of her.

Thankfully she didn't drop the stones, and when the two returned to the spot she followed Lacey's example and laid them all into Rodney's wheelbarrow. The supplies everyone had gathered were all together in the one area, and by the looks of it they actually did pretty well with it all - an incredibly large amount of wood, the rope Jasmine had retrieved, the collection of stones that she and Lacey had brought with them, a bottle of glue that Scarlett was holding in her hands, a few large pieces of sheet metal that she had also went out to bring back and, surprisingly, a small pile of solid-looking tree branches that looked fit enough to work as a hammer handle.

"Actually, it was Max who found them," Scarlett mentioned when Sammy asked about them. "He picked one up and dubbed it his 'New Weapon of Evil'. The rest were just lying nearby so we took them for the makeshift hammers, which you seem to have the stones for." Scarlett nodded towards the wheelbarrow.

"Yeah! I think they'll work really well with the sticks," Lacey said, picking one of each up and holding them together. "With a little bit of Jasmine's rope, we should be fine, I think."

"Indeed," Scarlett murmured, leaning closer to the items in Lacey's hands. "The weight of the stone should be lighter than the mass of the stick for adequate weight distribution while hammering the nails, so it was an excellent choice for the rocks. Nicely done."

"Okay, so I only understood, like, half of that," Lacey cheerfully said, "but I'm pretty sure I heard a compliment in there somewhere, so thanks!"

Sammy nodded her thanks as well, only choosing to voice it when Lacey lightly elbowed her in the side. "T-Thanks, Scarlett."

"Alright, Salmons!" Jasmine's voice rang out over everyone. "I've taken stock of what we grabbed and it looks pretty good! I reckon we'll have a decent shelter by the end of the day if we all put our backs into it!"

"You mean, if you order us around like slaves?" Topher interjected smugly, looking up from his broken mirror. "Not exactly a morale-boosting aspect for a team captain to have, don't'cha think?"

"Hey, someone's gotta do it, and you sure don't look like leader material," Jasmine shot right back with an unimpressed glower. "Besides, at least the rest of us managed to bring something _useful_."

"Whoa-ho-ho, what are you talking about?" Topher chuckled innocently. "I lost my old mirror when the zeppelin crashed, so I needed a replacement! Of course it's useful, without it I wouldn't be able to comb _this_ into perfection!"

"I mean for the-" Jasmine started, before she grunted in frustration and breathed in to calm herself. "Never mind that for now, we're still in the challenge." She began walking ahead of everyone and further away from the common area. "C'mon, team, let's go find us a spot for a shelter. We don't want the other team overtaking us so we _need_ to hurry!"

"Y-Yes, ma'am...!" Rodney bellowed out from behind the wheelbarrow. When Jasmine just shook her head and continued walking, he picked up the cart and followed her, his eyes practically glossed over for some reason or another.

"Man, what is _up_ with that guy?" Lacey whispered to Sammy as they, too, followed Jasmine along with everyone else. "He's been acting weird since the challenge started."

"Maybe he hurt his head somewhere," Sammy whispered back to her. "He looked fine, back on the zeppelin. I'm not really sure I understand it, though..."

"I'm not really sure I _want_ to understand it," Lacey shuddered.

...

A/N: Hi guys! Wow, it's been a while. Sorry for the delay, reality can be such a pain sometimes!

Anyways, to make up for being late, get ready for a special surprise: I'm uploading the following chapter along with this one! (Mainly because I wrote too much for one chapter and chose to split it into two, but that's besides the point).

I really hope you guys enjoyed this! Feel free to leave your thoughts and feelings in a review if you want to! And stay cool, guys!


	4. For The First Time In Ever

A few minutes of venturing through the forest found Sammy walking alongside Jasmine at the front of the group, with Lacey following behind the two talking animatedly with Scarlett. The three boys were in the back mostly ignoring everyone else for their own reasons.

"W-Wait, so you mean out of all of the world's deadliest animals, _eleven_ of them come from Australia?!" Sammy asked Jasmine with astonishment. "Wouldn't it be seriously dangerous there? Like, life-threatening?"

"Of course! But I didn't get where I was by stayin' under my bed, livin' in fear of 'em," Jasmine boasted proudly. "You can't call yourself a _true_ survivalist unless you stand up to the deadliness from down under!" She leaned closer to Sammy and whispered with a mischievous look on her face. "Many people think those blokes on those TV shows about survivin' in the wild are all the talk o' the town, but they'd be wettin' their pants if they had to go toe-to-toe with an _actual_ Tasmanian Devil."

"Wow..." Sammy murmured. "Did you manage to fight off a Tasmanian Devil before, Jasmine?"

"What, me? Pfft, no!" Jasmine laughed. "I saw someone on TV do it! No way I'd be fightin' one of those things."

Sammy stopped talking to think for a second. _'Did she just contradict herself? I think she just contradicted herself.'_

"Wait, hold up," Jasmine suddenly interrupted their discussion and stopped her walking as well. She started sniffing the air, moving her head in different directions to get a good whiff from everywhere.

"-so the guy's _still_ walking around with a chocolate sundae down his pants and a 'Tip Me Like a Cow' sign on his back, and he doesn't even _realise it_ until- _OOF!_" Lacey had been too preoccupied with her story to a slightly-unamused Scarlett to notice that Jasmine had halted their journey. "Hey! Why'd we stop?"

"Hush a minute," Jasmine said quietly, continuing to breathe in around her.

"Why are you sniffing like that?" Lacey inquired, head tilted slightly. "Do you smell food or something?"

"I said _hush_," Jasmine hissed. Lacey raised her hands defensively before shrugging it off and folding her arms. After a few more seconds of sniffing, Jasmine finally brought her hand to her chin. "Do you guys smell that? Somethin's smellin' really bad around here."

Sammy, curiosity piqued, followed Jasmine's example and sniffed the air deeply. She was right - there was a faint scent in the air, although it didn't really smell that good. But it was really familiar. Where had she smelled it before? "It smells... familiar. It's almost like I smelled it earlier. It smells kinda like..."

"...almost like burning fumes," Scarlett mumbled under her breath, before her eyes shot open. "The zeppelin. It must have crashed around this general area."

"Wait, does that mean we can get our stuff?!" Lacey nearly shrieked. "_Yes!_ I'd be able to get another change of clothes for myself!" She pulled on the hem of her blue tank top. "This outfit is cute, but wearing it for two weeks straight is _not _a good idea. It'd get all sticky and sweaty and stuff."

"We can look for it after the challenge," Jasmine told her. "We need to win this thing, remember?"

"Yeah, I know that," Lacey replied, "but still-"

"Look, it's an aircraft the size of a mansion," Jasmine said, trying to hold on her patience. "It's _not_ gonna suddenly disappear in a few hours. Our stuff'll be fine until then."

Lacey looked like she was going to fight back again, but apparently thought better of it and simply huffed out a breath. "Okay, okay, I get it. After the challenge we'll go looking for it."

"Glad we can agree on that," Jasmine smiled. Lacey merely shrugged indifferently. Just as Jasmine was about to turn back and return walking, she did a double take and looked at the back of the group. "Oh for the love of... _Where_ did Max run off to?"

Everyone's attention moved to the back of the pack. Just as she said, there were only six members of the team present - Max had seemingly disappeared at some point and didn't bother to tell anyone he was doing so.

"So he's not gonna help?" Sammy asked aloud. "That's not exactly fair."

"And not a good idea when we can all boot him off if we lose because of him," Jasmine grumbled before rolling her eyes. "Whatever, just forget him for now. We have more important things to do than worry about _him_."

"Sooo, does that mean I'm safe from elimination if we lose? What with the one who decided to ditch us and all?" Lacey decided to ask with a grin on her face.

"Not the _time,_ Lacey," Jasmine growled and picked up her pace.

Lacey leaned over to Sammy with a pleased smile. "That probably means I'm safe, y'know," she said with utter confidence in her voice.

_'I seriously doubt that,'_ Sammy decided not to say, and chose to continue following Jasmine in silence.

...

Another few minutes of walking and Jasmine stopped in front of an incredibly large tree, setting down the wood under her hands and issuing commands to everyone. The organizing of the supplies was the easy part, but actually using them to make a decent-sized shelter would've been impossible for Sammy on her own, even if she had a guide book to help her. It just wasn't in her to be able to build anything like that.

Thankfully, Jasmine knew exactly what she was doing. She'd instruct someone to bring her such and such or for another person to hurry it up with whatever was important, and although she gave out orders like an experienced captain, she had an incredibly short temper when it came to messing something up. Like, someone accidentally dropping the things they were carrying. She could be really scary when she got mad...

No one bothered to question her anymore, though, not after her argument with Lacey. Although not everyone might've liked it (Topher especially), they listened without complaint and did as they were told. A few hours and a _lot_ of climbing later, and Sammy and the others had finally finished their shelter - a two-roomed treehouse built on the sturdiest branches of the tree they worked under.

As soon as Jasmine finished hammering in the final nail (the nails Sammy brought with them!), Chris came soaring in from the sky on his jetpack. "This is nice!" he commended. "And a smart move building it above ground level!"

"Oh yeah?" a nasally voice asked from down below the treehouse. Glancing down, Sammy saw Max on the ground with his arms on his hips, glaring upwards at Chris. "And why's that?"

As if his question was the cue, what felt like a massive earthquake began, causing the treehouse and everyone on it to vibrate violently.

"Seriously?!" Lacey shouted above the noise. "_More_ shaking?! I've had enough of that for one lifetime, thank you!"

"I-I didn't think earthquakes were common in this area!" Sammy shouted at no one in particular, gripping the rail in front of her for dear life. "And why is this one so strong?!"

"Here comes your answer!" Chris shouted in response to the questions asked. Sammy followed his gaze toward a thicket of trees when suddenly, a stampede of moose, not an earthquake, appeared and ran right along underneath their shelter. And right where Max was.

The boy screamed and tried to get away, but he didn't make it in time and was trampled by the herd as they raced by. It looked excessively painful, and Sammy was extremely thankful she wasn't down there. When the animals quickly vanished from view, Max was left as a flattened mess on the ground, whining in pain and covered in bruises.

"This island is a little more _wild_ than the last one!" Chris laughed heartily (and a bit maniacally) before flying away in a random direction.

"I'd say I was sorry for the little guy," Jasmine said as she walked over to the railing, "but honestly, that'd be a lie."

"You don't think he's hurt, do you?" Sammy asked worriedly, eyeing Max's twitching body with concern.

"I don't think you can walk away from being run over by a herd of angry moose and get out unharmed," Lacey told them. She leapt on top of the railing and grabbed the rope that acted as their entrance and exit to the treehouse. "Hang on, little gnome boy, I'm comin' to help ya!"

She leapt off the side and tried to take care him, but he refused every offer she made. As the two of them started arguing with one another (a fight that Sammy had no intention of interrupting since time was no longer of the essence), Jasmine turned around to gaze at the hard work their team had just spent the last three hours doing. "Beauty, isn't she?" the Australian girl asked her. "I mean, not really, given that we found all of this in a garbage dump, but it's still impressive that we put it all together, yeah?"

"Yeah," Sammy agreed with her, turning herself around to take the shelter in. "Although it was really difficult... I don't think I've gotten that many splinters before in my life..."

"Splinters are _nothin'_ compared to what's out there, y'know," Jasmine chuckled. "But hey, what doesn't kill ya makes you stronger, right?"

"R-Right, yeah..." Sammy nervously agreed. _'Boy, don't I know that well.'_

Jasmine nodded and leapt off the shelters balcony without warning. _And_ without the exit rope. "Right then, I'd say it's time to go meet up with the other team and see who won! Anyone coming with?"

"Yeah yeah, be there in a second!" Lacey responded to her distractedly, as she was still trying to take care of Max. "Just let me at least pop your shoulder back into place, okay?! That could really start to hurt after a while!"

"I have told you I require no assistance, woman!" Max spat at her, his voice trembling slightly from the pain. "I will do this myself!"

"Alright, you know what, let's not." Without another word, Lacey forcefully gripped Max's upper arm-

"Wait! Unhand me you- _AAAARRRGHH!_"

-and pulled on it in one swift motion. There was a sickening _POP_, enough for Sammy and the others to cringe at. Max's loud, terrified cry was enough to send a flock of birds out of the nearby trees and towards the sky, although after a few more quick moments those cries died down.

"...Hey, it doesn't hurt anymore. Thanks!" he happily said to her, standing on slightly wobbly legs and hobbling off after Jasmine.

"No problem-o, that's what I'm here for!" Lacey said, folding her arms in satisfaction. She turned back to the others still up on the treehouse's balcony. "C'mon, what're you guys waiting for?"

The remaining four on the balcony, slightly disturbed at how seamless that entire thing was, awkwardly shrugged and left the balcony, following the skipping Lacey towards the meeting area.

...

Half an hour later, and the group of seven were returning to the treehouse, fresh bags of fast food in their hands and victory in their hearts.

"Heck yeah!" Lacey cheered, running circles around everyone. "I knew it, I knew we could do it! And we get free food out of it too!" She opened her bag and allowed the scent to infiltrate her nostrils. "Man, I haven't had these burgers in forever!"

"Hrmm... Glad someone likes this..." Sammy mumbled, holding her bag as far from her as possible. She was _not_ a fan of fast food at all - too many carbs and too much fat, things that she had been attempting to avoid for the good majority of her life. _'Eat too much of it and you'll gain weight... and that'd basically be a free ticket for Amy to torment me even more.'_ She pushed the thoughts aside and smiled at the practically-drooling Lacey. "Still, it's great that we won our first challenge."

"The probability of us winning the challenge was certainly in our favor," Scarlett said, walking up alongside them. "As opposed to the other team, we have members who are experienced in constructing various forms of buildings, so, in hindsight, there was absolutely no reason to be concerned about it."

"Totally!" Lacey cheered, jutting her hands into the air in triumph. "See, Jasmine? There wasn't any reason to worry! Like I said, we had this in the bag!"

"Yeah, yeah, you're right about that," Jasmine chuckled. "Still, you gotta admit, it was at least good exercise to be workin' that hard."

"Are you kidding me?" Topher whined at her. "I moved so many pieces of wood that my calluses have calluses!" He stuck out his hands to show off that, indeed, his hands were very rubbed after handling all of lumber. "My delicate hands were _not_ meant to be dealing with that much physical labor!"

"Wha- We're on a game show where practically _all_ the challenges get physical!" Jasmine told him with a bewildered look. "Why would you sign up if you weren't expecting _calluses_?"

"Hey, I have my reasons, so let's keep it at that," Topher said smoothly, before opening his bag and examining the contents. "You think what's in here is full of nutrients? I need my skin to be as flawless as it already is so I'm not sure this is suitable for me to eat."

"Yeah, it's perfect for your skin," Lacey said to him, her voice full of sarcasm. "Same way that mud is perfect for it as well."

Topher snapped his fingers in Lacey's direction and grinned. "Yeah! Mud baths! See, you get what I'm talking about!"

Lacey allowed her eyelids to droop over her eyes. "Well, that failed, didn't it."

Sammy couldn't help but giggle. "It was worth a shot, I think."

The redhead looked back at the shorter blonde and grinned. "Glad you think so! Hey, did you want to eat this with me? Eating with people is more fun than eating alone, right?"

Her question almost made her stop. _'Did... Did she just ask to eat with me? As in, like, hanging out with her? ...No one's ever asked me to do that before...! I, I'm not sure how to react! I-I gotta act natural, make it seem like this is a common occurrance!'_

Sammy took a quick glance to the bag dangling between her two fingers and shuddered at what was inside. "Um, I-I think I'll pass on the eating part... But I'll still sit with you if you want!"

"Works for me!" Lacey cheered. "Although you need to eat too. Preeetty sure you didn't have anything for lunch on the zeppelin. Or, maybe then again, you _did_ and they were serving lunch and I just didn't see it. Did they serve lunch on it? Ooh, what if the lunch is still in one piece?! Maybe we can find it when we go look for the zeppelin! Oh wait a sec, speaking of which-" Lacey sprinted over to Jasmine and tapped her on the shoulder. "Yo, Jazzy. Where's the zeppelin to again?"

"That's what I'm tryin' to find out..." Jasmine mumbled distractedly. She looked in every which way as the team strolled along the woods, occassionally sniffing the air for any sign of the fallen aircraft. "This is so weird... This _is_ the area where we smelled the fumes, right?"

"It... _looks_ familiar enough," Sammy noted, eyeing the different trees that were around them. "I... think."

"It all looks the same to me," Lacey admitted, before stomping on the ground in a huff. "Dangit, I _knew_ we should've went for it then and there!"

"Calm down, Lacey," Jasmine said half-heartedly. "Crashed zeppelins don't just get up and walk away. It should be around here somewhere." She turned to the rest of the team and bellowed over them, "If you guys want to go back to the treehouse and eat, go right ahead. I'm goin' to look for the zeppelin. Anyone who wants to come, feel free. Otherwise, you're dismissed."

"Spoken like a true leader," Scarlett told her as she stopped next to her. "You make an excellent team captain, if I do say so myself."

"Thanks, Scarlett," Jasmine grinned at her, before turning it into a smirk and directing it at Lacey. "At least _someone's_ appreciative of me taking the leader's role."

Lacey merely stuck her tongue out at the taller woman. "Whatevs! I'm going to go look for things now." She walked past everyone and off into a direction she seemingly chose at random.

Sammy glanced back at the others and saw Scarlett, Max and Topher going off in separate directions, leaving only her, Jasmine and Rodney in the one spot. And once again, Rodney seemed to be doing that odd thing he's been doing recently.

Not entirely keen on being around that, Sammy raised her hand to draw Jasmine's attention. "Um, I'm probably gonna go off on my own, too."

Jasmine nodded with a smile. "Sure thing! Meet us back here in, say, thirty minutes if you can't find anythin' though. Don't want you gettin' lost on us, now, do we?"

"I-I think I'll be fine," Sammy said reassuringly as best she could, which admittedly wasn't that reassuring. Jasmine nonetheless shrugged and allowed her to leave.

She waved goodbye as she walked away in her own direction, one-hundred percent unsure as to where this particular path was leading to. She felt as though Jasmine was correct in saying that spot was where they first smelled the fumes, so the zeppelin must have been around the area _somewhere_. If she didn't find it (which would probably be the case), then surely the others would manage to do so. Jasmine could probably track it down within minutes, if her story about tracking the kangaroos from earlier was true. And Scarlett was smart - she'd probaly be able to use some sort of calculation or something to help her. Half the time Sammy didn't even know what she was talking about...

And then there was Lacey. That girl was something else. She was like a gigantic bouncy-ball that ping-ponged off of everything in her path. She seemed completely fearless and didn't back down from a challenge, if how she stood up to Jasmine earlier meant something. To be able to do that showed a lot of confidence, something Sammy severely lacked...

She suddenly slapped her cheeks at that thought. _'No, no! You will _not_ get jealous of anyone here, you have absolutely no right to do so! It doesn't matter if she has the traits you want to have, you are _not _going to start thinking negatively about Lac-'_

"Hey, Sammy!"

"_WAHH!_" Sammy ended up reeling back so much her foot slipped from under her and she ended up falling onto the ground in a heap. Her head smacked against the dirt with a loud _thump_ and the pain shot through her like a bee sting. "Ow! Ouuuch..."

"Oh, shoot!" Lacey shot out from the tree she was standing behind and rushed over to Sammy's side. "Shoot shoot shoot, I'm so sorry I didn't mean for that to happen! Are you okay? You're not bleeding or anything are you?! Ohhhh God I don't have any proper first aid supplies around here...!"

"I-I'm fine..." Sammy winced as she raised into a sitting position. "I've dealt with worse before..." _'Amy's outbursts are _always_ worse, no questioning that.'_

"Wait, what? Really?" Lacey asked in shock. "Why'd you have to suffer worse than a smack to the head?"

Sammy felt herself freeze up. _'Crap! Talking about Amy is the last thing I want to do here... Gotta play this off.'_ "U-Um, well y-you see..." Her eyes darted desperately around, and quickly landed on the skirt around her waist. "B-Because I'm a cheerleader, right? Sometimes the routines don't go as smoothly as one might think, haha..."

Lacey considered this for a moment, and for a split second, Sammy was sure that her darn stuttering would've given her away. But eventually, Lacey nodded in understanding. "Ahh, gotcha, gotcha. That _does_ make sense. You'd be up on top of the pyramid and then one person has to sneeze and then it _alllll_ just comes tumbling down..." Her eyebrows scrunched together suddenly. "Actually, wait a second. Another question: why _did_ you become a cheerleader in the first place? Sorry, but you don't really seem the type."

"Oh, um-" _'Crap crap crap crap crap-! M-Maybe I could tell sort of a... half-truth?'_ "M-My, um... my sister got me into it... I, I guess you could say..." She certainly did. Although practically forcing Sammy into it with the threat of blackmail wasn't really something she wanted to explain...

"Oh, wait, seriously? You have a sister?" Lacey's eyes seemed to light up at that. "And she got you into cheerleading? Omi_gosh_ that was so nice of her!"

Sammy could feel her insides clench up. _'Nice? Amy? When hell freezes over, maybe. And even then, I really, _really_ doubt it.'_ Through gritted teeth, Sammy managed to reply, "Y-Yeah, it really was... _nice_ of her..."

"So, tell me, what's she like? Is she older than you? Younger? And by how much?"

Sammy grimaced on the inside. "S-She's older, by... w-well, seventeen minutes..." A fact that Amy _loved_ to rub in her face. Constantly.

"Seventeen mi-" Lacey's hands reached out to grab one of Sammy's and her eyes shot open even wider, a feat Sammy thought had been impossible until that point. "Wait, you're twins?! Holy _crap_ that is so cool! Identical or fraternal?"

_'Please, please, _stop_ with all the questions about her! Argh, I came here to get away from her and now she's the talk of the island!'_ She let a scowl cover her face by a microscopic amount, not enough for Lacey to take notice, thankfully. "I-Identical."

"Oh _man_ that is so _awesome_! I don't have a sibling myself, never have never will, so the thought of waking up and seeing _yourself_ across the table while eating breakfast sounds amazing! Hey, how come she didn't audition for Total Drama, anways? Or did she and just wasn't accepted?"

Honestly, Sammy was very close to telling Lacey that she had enough of those questions. Amy was the very last thing she wanted to think about while she was here, and while she was certainly _not_ doing a good job with that on her own, having someone ask about her didn't exactly help matters either.

Thankfully, she was spared from having to snap at her from the appearance of Jasmine from the far side of the clearing they were in. "Ahh, there you two are. We fo-" She stopped her sentence when she saw the position Sammy and Lacey were currently in - namely, Sammy on the ground and Lacey crouched right over her with one hand in both of hers. "...Am I interruptin' somethin' here?"

"Wha?" Lacey glanced back down at Sammy and the two of them took notice of where exactly her hands were. "_OH!_ Oh oh I'm so sorry!" She instantly let go of Sammy's hand and jumped to her feet, before twirling around to Jasmine. "Also it wasn't what it looked like, she fell and hit her head and I went to go help but then we started talking and I got excited and-"

"Easy, tiger! I didn't say anything was goin' on here!" Jasmine chucked and held her arms up in defense. "I was just lookin' for you guys 'cuz I wanted to tell you we found it."

"The zeppelin?" Sammy piped up, standing to her feet and attempting to forget about bitterness she had just been feeling. "You guys found it?"

"Well, not... exactly," Jasmine admitted, scratching her head. "We didn't actually find the zeppelin itself, but... we _did_ find a bunch of discarded luggage."

"...Huh?" Lacey quirked an eyebrow at the taller girl. "But the... the luggage was _inside_ the zeppelin. How did you find the luggage, but not the thing they were in? Unless a hole got blown through the storage room and some fell out before the crash, that just doesn't make any sense. Or maybe the zeppelin really _did_ get up and walk away..."

"Hey, don't ask me, I'm just the one reportin' what Scarlett found," Jasmine replied. She turned on her heel and motioned for the two to follow her. "Anyway, it's not really that far from here, so let's get goin'."

"Okay!" Lacey cheered, rushing over to where Jasmine was headed. Sammy followed as well, quickly catching up to Lacey and ignoring the dull throbbing in the back of her head. Lacey suddenly leaned in closer to her and whispered, "Once we get back to the treehouse, you can keep telling me about your sister if you want to!"

Sammy went wide-eyed and the bitterness she had been trying to forget intensified. She did _not_ want to return to that topic of conversation, not now not _ever_. Of course, she couldn't outright say no, either, or else Lacey would get suspicious... It wasn't exactly an ideal situation to be in. "G-Great...!" Sammy forced out, knowing that the subject was anything _but_. Lacey grinned and returned her attention to the path ahead, leaving Sammy to dread whatever future events might occur.

...

"Huh...? T-This is _my_ bag!"

Sammy knelt down next to the black duffel bag, her name cleanly written on the tag attached to its strap. It looked completely undamaged, save for a few bits of seared metal adorning the top of it.

"I'm honestly amazed that these didn't burn in the crash," Scarlett murmured to herself, eyeing everyone else as they searched for their own things. "Of course, since I only found my clipboard and the paper I brought, perhaps not everything was as lucky as your bag."

Thinking on this, Sammy desperately opened up the bag to check its contents. After quickly checking, she sighed in relief - despite only bringing a handful of items, everything was there. Her pyjamas were still in one piece, thank goodness, and her spare uniform was still as clean as when she took it out of the closet. The swimsuit she brought was there as well, but she wasn't exactly ready to use it right yet...

_'Although I still wish I was able to bring _normal_ clothes, besides my uniforms... Ugh, leave it to Amy to decide to hide all of my clothes or make them dirty before I leave for the show and just make them completely unwearable...'_

"Oh, is that your bag?" Lacey's voice sounded from behind her. She bent down next to Sammy and took a peek inside. "Huh, not much left in there. Did it all get lost in the crash, I wonder?"

"Actually, uh..." Sammy rubbed her arm awkwardly. "T-That's all I brought, really..."

"It is? How come?" Lacey replied.

Sammy's face contorted. How was she explaining _this_ one? "I-I guess I just... didn't want to risk getting all of my clothes dirty." _'Although the complete opposite already happened.'_

"Huhh, that's actually a smart idea," Lacey nodded. "Wouldn't want to ruin your good clothes, right? The challenges on this show can get just a _liiiittle _bit messy sometimes."

"Y-Yeah. And the cheer squad's uniforms are actually p-pretty cheap, so they're... easily replaceable."

_That_ was a straight up lie. The uniform was surprisingly costly, which was one of the many reasons as to why Amy chose to leave them clean so that 'she could get them dirty on her own, get in trouble for it and have to pay full price for extra pairs.' It wasn't like she had an unlimited source of allowance to get new ones, either...

"B-But anyway," Sammy stammered out a topic change, zipping up the bag and standing up. "What about you? Did you find anything of yours?"

Lacey sighed heavily and hung her head. "Nope. Absolutely nothing here belongs to me! My sunglasses are gone and all my changes of clothes and everything!" She looked up with a small pout. "Although it's not too bad. I can just replace it all when I get home... And besides, I know I said I wouldn't want to wear this same outfit day in and day out, but a little bit of water and a bit of elbow grease should do the trick if it gets dirty! The matieral's actually really resistant to gunk and grime, so I'm not worried at all!"

Sammy smiled at her herself. "That's great to hear. It's a lot better than these uniforms..."

"Then you just gotta try extra hard not to get them dirty!" Lacey leapt to her feet and grinned. "Besides, even if you _do_ get mud or something on them, you could always just buy new ones. Like you said, they're cheap, right?"

Sammy winced. There was no way she wouldn't feel guilty about having to lie like that, not at all. "Y-Yeah, you're right."

"'Course I am!" Lacey looped her arm around Sammy's neck and started leading her toward the treehouse. "Anyways, since we found what we could, let's go eat that food! I'm starving!"

Sammy groaned at the thought of it. It was _so_ tempting to have the burger, but she really _really_ didn't want to gain weight... "D-Do you think there might be some fruit around here or something? I... I don't really think I'm in the mood for take out..."

"Ehh, we'll find something, I'm sure! Now let's pick up the pace!"

...

A few hours later, after berries had been found in a nearby bush and their meals thoroughly devoured (Lacey being hungry enough to eat both her own _and_ Sammy's meals), the sun was beginning to set against the horizon. Sammy and Lacey found themselves sitting along the edge of the balcony, the empty take out bags turned into paper balls and discarded haphazardly next to them, as they watched the giant orb in the sky descend past the ocean's water.

Lacey shielded her eyes from the sun's energy and whistled. "Man, this is honestly a _great_ view. Gotta hand it to Jasmine, she sure knows how to pick a good spot for a sunset."

"Yeah... it really is pretty, isn't it?" Sammy said to her.

"Back at home, we live, like, right smack dab in the middle of a suburb with huge houses, so getting to see the sunset from home was im_possible_. The only thing I was able to see were the old folks across the street in their windows dancing to old 70s disco music. It gets _really_ tiring after the first hour or so of it."

Sammy let out a giggle at the thought of senior citizens in disco jackets, dancing away in a club. "That must be an interesting sight to see."

"Yeah, only if you're in the mood to want to _gouge_ your eyes out. I've seen more broken hips than anyone I know, I swear."

Sammy's laugh grew slightly louder, earning her another grin from the girl beside her. "This is really nice, though..." Sammy said quietly, looking across the beautiful orange-tinted ocean as a flock of birds flew past them. "I mean, besides the fact that every day we're going to need to take part in life-threatening challenges... I think it's nice to be able to get out for once. To just enjoy times like this with... well, strangers, I guess."

The two of them laughed once more, but that actually caused Sammy to think for a second. What exactly did she classify Lacey as? And for that matter, Jasmine and the rest of them? They weren't exactly _friends_, she believed - it hadn't even been twelve hours since they first met. Yet here she and Lacey were, sitting on the edge of their treehouse shelter, watching the sun set and laughing as if they had been the best of friends since they were children.

They hardly knew each other, but now that she was thinking about it, what did _Lacey _think of _her_ anyway? She must've at least liked her, considering that she was willing to spend time with her as much as she already had... But no one has ever liked her enough to want to hang out with _just_ her. Most times it'd be Amy's friends who wanted to hang out with her sister, and Sammy would get dragged along in order to pay for whatever they were doing... Why would this random girl whom she had never even heard of before the ride here, willingly choose to try and be her friend? It just didn't make any-

"You know, you were _really_ cool today."

Sammy snapped out of her thoughts and turned towards Lacey. "I... I'm sorry?"

The girl next to her smiled at her. "Earlier today. During the challenge, when Jasmine and I were having that little argument. You decided to be the mediator and made us stop. You made us focus back on the important thing, winning against the other team, instead of trying to win against each other. I honestly never thought you had it in you to shout like that, but you did, and it was _awesome_! You stood up and took control and helped us win and stuff and junk, y'know?"

Lacey's hands were balled into fists and held up in the air, her mouth split into a grin and her eyes wide and shining. It reminded Sammy of someone who had just come in first in a nation-wide competition.

It took a moment for Sammy to grasp, that it was _she_ who Lacey was looking at in that way.

Sammy nervously flicked her hair to the side and looked off in the other. "W-Well, I-I don't really... I-I mean... I-I mean it's not like I really _did_..." She stopped, sighed quietly, figured that she had done enough denying for one day, and turned back to Lacey, hesitantly encouraged by the other's praise. "...Y... You... You really think so...?"

"Uh-huh!" Lacey nodded enthusiastically, the spark of delight not leaving her eyes.

Sammy continued to look at her, at her unwavering confidence and positivity. _'This... Is this what having a friend feels like? I never had a friend before so I guess I wouldn't know, but... This energy and light she's giving off... And she's being so _nice_ to me...' _Tentatively, Sammy felt her own smile begin to grow, until it became on full-on grin not unlike Lacey's own. _'Yeah. I think I can say that Lacey definitely thinks of me as a friend.'_

Looking back towards the horizon, Sammy continued to smile happily as the sun completely disappeared over the water. _'Maybe... Maybe this show really _is_ the best thing to happen to me.'_

...

A/N: And that's chapter 3! Thanks for tuning in! Not really much to say here, though...

Although I _did_ want to just say thanks to my pal and godsend Nick for helping me with this chapter, the previous one, and hopefully the rest to come! You're doing me a favor that I won't be able to return with just food and car rides alone!

But anyways, thanks for tuning in folks! Remember to leave a review before you leave! See you next time! (Whenever that'll be).


	5. Hurting Hands, Healing Hands

_~Blast From the Past~_

8 Weeks Prior

"_SAMEY!_ Get your lazy ass out of bed!"

Without any time to process the noise entering her drowsy mind, Sammy felt her body be forcefully pushed off of her warm, oh so comfortable bed onto the not-as-comfortable-and-probably-dirty carpeted floor. She landed with a thud, causing a yelp to escape out of her mouth and a flash of pain to flow through her hip from the impact.

"Why the _hell_ didn't you wake me up half an hour ago?!" Amy shrieked at her from the other side of her bed, her hair a spiky mess from sleeping. "You're going to make me late for the test today, you idiot!"

"W-Wha-?" Sammy, still completely disoriented, desperately rubbed the sleep out of her eyes and looked at the alarm clock on her bedside table. 7:00 AM. School started in an hour. With both of their parents gone for the morning, they needed to walk to school, and walking took a good 20 minutes itself. And with the amount of preparing Amy had to do to get ready... _'Crap.'_ They were probably going to be late. "...Oh my gosh. I... I'm so sorry, I-I thought I had my alarm set and-"

"_'Thought'_ isn't good enough, Samey!" The older sister rounded to the other side of the bed and yanked _hard_ on Sammy's platinum locks.

"_Ow!_"

"Stop your whining!" she shouted again, pulling once more on her younger sister's hair. Sammy tried her best to remain silent despite the searing agony tearing at her scalp. "Now listen up! You're going to make me breakfast while I shower, and when I'm finished eating, we're leaving, whether you're ready to go or not. You hear me?!"

"Yes, Amy, I-I do!" Sammy screamed in response, the tears already beginning to form at the edges of her eyes. "Just please, _please_ stop hurting me!"

Amy growled and threw Sammy's head forward, causing the younger sister to curl into a ball instinctively. The older one scoffed, before walking to the door. "You know exactly what I want for breakfast. If it's not to my standards - which are, of course, _perfect_ - you know what's going to happen. Right?" She waited five seconds for a response. There was none. "_Right?!_"

Sammy's muscles tensed at her sister's shout. "Yes! Y-Yes, I know, Amy!"

Amy glared daggers at the girl cowering between her legs on the other side of the bed, before she shook her head and walked towards the bathroom.

As soon as she heard the door lock and the fan to the bathroom turn on, Sammy let out a frustrated sigh and allowed her held-back whimpers to be set free.

_'This is an absolute nightmare...'_ Sammy thought as the tears streamed down her face. _'I can't stand up for myself when I need to the most, which is _all the time_. Dammit, I can't put up with this! I really, _really_ hope they call about Total Drama soon and let me leave here... Assuming they even want me on the show in the first place...''_

Her self-pity was cut short - she had breakfast for one to make, and not for herself. Chances were she wasn't going to be allowed to eat that morning if she screwed up. Sammy quickly slipped on her slippers and made her way downstairs (making sure to dry her eyes before doing so). She entered the empty kitchen and immediately got to work on making the pancakes: retrieving the proper ingredients, setting the dial on the stove to _just_ the right temperature and using the pan that had that little scratch mark on the side of it - that one apparently produced the best taste, or something. Despite it being a weird request, Sammy never questioned it, mainly because she didn't want to be at the sharp end of a knife for questioning her sister.

She set to work, expertly going through the motions she had long since learned how to perform. After making the same exact meal for God knew how long, the pattern was practically ingrained into her brain.

After roughly ten minutes of careful preparation (and desperately praying the shower didn't turn off before she was finished), Sammy laid out the pancakes on Amy's favorite plate and placed them in her spot at the kitchen table. The younger twin then grabbed a glass and poured the fat-free milk into it, laid it next to the plate, and finally sat in her own spot on Amy's right (it was never Amy who sat on Sammy's left). And from there, she waited.

Another five minutes, and the shower turned off. Amy soon appeared in the kitchen, wearing her bath robe and a towel in her hair, wrapping it up into a sloppy updo.

"The last _freaking_ time I leave it to you to wake me up," Amy muttered to herself upon entry. "Don't even have enough time to put on makeup..."

Sammy didn't say a word. She just lowered her head and attempted to avoid her sister's gaze at all costs. _'What's even the point of getting mad at me sleeping in, anyway? She knows I'm a heavy sleeper...'_

Amy ungracefully flopped onto her chair and examined the contents on her plate. Without a word, she grabbed the fork at its side and chomped hungrily into the food.

A few moments passed as Sammy waited with baited breath, watching her sister chew out of the corner of her eye. Was it good? She did everything right, right? She should have, she made sure to. She flipped them perfectly, added exactly the right amount of blueberries and chocolate chips... She even made sure to have the glass of milk on Amy's left side, as she used her right hand to use her fork. There was absolutely no reason for her to get upset. ...Right?

Thankfully, there wasn't. "Passable," Amy mumbled with a full mouth, not bothering with looking at her sister as she spoke. "Get changed. We leave in ten."

Sammy refused to let her relief show on her face. She nodded once quickly, and silently exited the kitchen. She returned to her room and closed the door, at which point she finally allowed the tiniest of smiles to grace her lips. She actually managed to do it right for once, and for that she was allowed to be happy, if only for a moment. The smile was short lived, however - she was working on limited time. She had to get ready, _now_.

Luckily for her (or maybe unluckily?), getting ready for school under pressure was another occurrence that Sammy frequently experienced. She hastily threw on the first set of clothes she grabbed and straightened her hair in record time, thanking God that she didn't move around in her sleep enough to give her a major case of bedhead. She also applied a very small bit of makeup to make her look a little less tired than she actually was.

Within minutes she was ready to go to school. Granted, she wasn't looking as good as she _could've_ been (although given that it was _her_, looking good according to Amy was quite difficult), but circumstances prevented that. She quickly exited her room, glancing down the hall to see that her sister's door was closed with the sign on it flipped onto 'Do Not Enter'. She must have finished her breakfast and was getting ready herself.

Sammy took those spare extra minutes to brush her teeth, and by the time Amy was coming down the stairs, she was already down by the front door waiting for her.

"Let's go," Amy grumbled as she briskly walked past Sammy, reaching for both her coat and umbrella from the closet.

...Coat and umbrella? "Hey, um... Why are you taking both of those with you?" Sammy asked, already dreading what was sure to be a harsh reply.

She wasn't let down in that regard. Amy turned to her sister, a look of both confusion and anger melted together on her face. "Are you serious? Do you not even _hear_ the rain pouring outside?"

Sammy blinked and focused on listening for the sound of water droplets. Sure enough, there was a light tapping noise coming from outside, just barely audible enough to hear. Sammy must have been too focused on the chaotic morning events to even hear it.

"So not only are you stupid, but deaf, too? Jesus Christ." Amy hauled on her coat and opened the door, letting the cool breeze of the clouded morning take over the heated entrance. "Unless you want to get to school soaking wet, I suggest you take that pitiful excuse of an umbrella with you."

The younger twin grimaced and reached for her own umbrella. While it wasn't damaged in the least, it did have an odd assortment of colors on it. Sammy found it cute, but Amy hated the thing entirely. _'One of the few things that Amy actually lets me keep instead of taking it for herself. If it weren't for our parents, I swear I probably wouldn't even have my own room.'_

Without another word, Amy stepped out into the rain and opened her umbrella, not waiting for her younger sister to do the same. Sammy clumsily pulled on her jacket and opened her own umbrella as she moved outside, closing and locking the door behind her and racing after the already-departing Amy.

The rain wasn't pouring _too _heavily as the sisters made their way down the sidewalk, although by the looks of how big the puddles on the road were, it had been coming down for at least a few hours now. The wind wasn't blowing too hard either, but Sammy's umbrella was also a little old and, knowing her luck, could turn inside out at any moment.

Amy's pace didn't let up for a second, and Sammy was _not _about to tell her to slow down. After a few more minutes of silently walking behind her, the older sister suddenly veered off to the right, off of the sidewalk and onto the dirt path that some students were known to use as a shortcut. Seeing as how they were running short on time anyway, Sammy didn't question the unspoken decision and continued to obediently follow her sister.

A few more minutes of walking on the path, however, proved to be fatal for her. About halfway up the trail, Amy suddenly stopped for a fraction of a second. Sammy, her eyes focused on the ground below her, looked upwards toward her sister and didn't notice the incriminating action until it was too late - Amy's foot stuck out to her side, right in front of Sammy's own, and the quick pace she had been going at forced her to fall right over her sister's leg and directly towards the mud puddle right in front of them.

With a cry of surprise and shock, Sammy fell face-first into the mud with an unattractive _splat_. There, she lay for a few stifling moments, neither one of the sisters moving from their positions or saying a word. Despite having a first-hand experience to it, Sammy still wasn't one hundred percent sure on what had just transpired.

And then-

"Pffffthahahaha_hahahaha!_"

Amy started laughing hysterically, slowly at first but then building it up as the moments passed. It continued on for what felt like hours, but eventually she calmed down enough to speak coherently. "O-M-_G_, I cannot _believe _you actually fell for that! That was, like, the oldest trick in the book!"

Still dazed from the impact on the ground, Sammy slowly brought her hands underneath her and pushed herself up onto her mud-covered knees. She had luckily closed her mouth as she fell, but the mud still managed to find itself all over her face. She carfully wiped it off with the clean side of her sleeve and hesitantly glanced back up to Amy, tears glistening in her eyes. "A-Amy, wh-"

After taking one look at Sammy, Amy ended up doubling over in a harder laughing fit, both hands on her stomach and her umbrella falling to her side. She didn't seem to care that the rain was now pouring onto her. "Holy _shit_, Samey, you should see the look on your face!" Her grin widened. "This _really_ isn't the time to be taking a mud bath, you know. Pfft_hahaha!_"

Sammy felt her shoulders shake as the tears she fought back flowed from her eyes. _'Why, _why_ did I think nothing was wrong with her taking the trail in the rain?! I'm such an idiot, I can't believe I fell for something like this _again_!'_ Wiping her face with her sleeve once more (the other one this time), Sammy took another look at her howling sister. "W-Why did you do th-"

"Because you didn't wake me up when you were supposed to!" Amy interrupted, the smile still on her face but any trace of laughter having disappeared. "You deserved it." Her smile grew viciously. "Now then... Since I have a little bit more time to spare, let's play a game, shall we?"

Sammy blinked. "A... game?" _'This can only end badly...'_

"That's right, a game." Amy put her hands behind her back and started walking around Sammy. "I've graciously decided to give you two choices. One: go to school as is and become the laughing stock of the school, _again_, only this time as the mud monster that you really are. Or two: run home and change out of those ugly little clothes you decided to wear for some reason..." she turned to her sister, her malicious grin still there, "and hopefully miss out on the test!"

...

The test.

_'...Crap. Crap crap crap _crap crap CRAP! _The test! I-I forgot all about it this morning! Oh, oh my God what am I going to do, I don't have time to run home and clean all this mud off and make it back to finish it! And I can't go to school like this now or else I'll be made fun of for the rest of my life! Oh God, why did this have to happen _now_?! Why did Amy have to do this?!'_

"Well?" Amy's sadistic voice drilled right through her thoughts, snapping her out of it and looking back up. Amy had bent forward slightly, sticking her face right in Sammy's and causing the younger twin to reel back slightly. "What's it gonna be, _Samey_?"

Sammy's breathing grew faster and deeper. She had to make a choice, _now_. Time was ticking, she couldn't afford to delay. What should she do? Risk failing the test and manage to hold on to what little dignity she had left? Or go to school as she was in order to at the very least pass it, but also become the school fool for the rest of her high school days?

There was only one correct answer, Sammy soon realized. And with that, she hastily stood up, grabbed her umbrella, and dashed back towards home, all the while helplessly trying to block out the shrill cackling ringing in her ears.

...

_~The Gift of Today~_

Present Time

"Psst, hey! Wake up, you lazy butt!"

Sammy's eyes exploded open at the sound of a voice as she scrambled to sit herself upright. Had she slept in again? Of course she had, what else could it have been? It had to be the summer's heat making her more drowsy than normal. Yeah, that was it. "I-I'm up, I'm up! I'm so sorry, I had the alarm set I swear, please don't hurt me or kick me off the-"

Now straight up, Sammy turned to hop out of the bed and being work on Amy's breakfast as she did every morning, when she found herself face to face with the person who had woken her up. That person was, apparently, _not_ her sister, but rather the girl who had willing spent the entire day with her yesterday, staring at her with wide, confused eyes.

"...bed," Sammy lamely finished, her own eyes as big as saucers. "Um... hi."

"Uh, good morning to you too," Lacey's baffled look turned into her signature grin from her crouching position on the floor. "You, uh, you look like you slept good last night!"

"Y... Yeah..." Sammy took a quick glance around the very crude room they were in, specifically the girl's side of her team's treehouse shelter. Directly across from her bed was Scarlett's, the owner of which looked to be still very fast asleep. Sammy breathed a sigh of relief when she realized she hadn't woken her up, and looked back down at Lacey. She rubbed the sleep out of her eyes as she hoped to God that the redhead would forget what exactly just happen for the rest of her life and never bring it up again. "What time is it...?"

"By the looks of the sun's position, I'd say about a little after seven." Jasmine's voice cut through the room. Sammy and Lacey looked over to the doorway to see the taller girl leaning against the top of the doorframe, a handful of burlap sacks in her other hand. "You guys don't know how to tell the time from the sun?"

"What? No, of course not," Lacey answered in an almost-offended voice, standing up and stretching her legs. "At least, I don't. Do you?" she specifically asked Sammy. The other girl shook her head 'no,' and Lacey turned back towards Jasmine. "See? Not all of us have used tree branches instead of beds long enough to figure that out, y'know."

"I just think you lot need t' get out more," Jasmine chuckled. "Now c'mon, we're burnin' daylight. The berries aren't gonna pick themselves."

"Huh?" Sammy stood from her bed as Lacey skipped towards Jasmine. "We're going berry picking?"

The two other girls turned around, with the redhead speaking first, giving her forehead a light smack. "Oh, duh, I knew there was something I was forgetting to ask. Sammy, wanna come foraging for breakfast with us?"

"I literally _just_ told you to ask her, and you forget that quickly? Sheesh," Jasmine playfully scoffed at her. Lacey just stuck her tongue at her.

While Jasmine laughed and Lacey pouted, Sammy was left to think: _'Wait, they're... actually asking me to go with them...? That's _never_ happened back at home!_' With an eager smile, Sammy walked over to the two and nodded. "Sure! I'd love to go with you guys!"

"Excellent!" Jasmine replied, taking one of the sacks from her hand and tossing it to Sammy, who caught it with ease. "But first, ya might want to change into somethin' else. A shirt and pair of shorts three sizes too small for you aren't exactly things you'd want to wear when walkin' around in the forest. You could easily scratch yourself from branches and whatnot."

Sammy looked down at her attire, unconsciously folding her arms against herself to shield her body from wayward eyes. "Oh, um, yeah, th-these were all I had available when I was leaving, so..." Not a total lie, she told herself - Amy was fortunate enough to leave at least _something_ for her to wear at night, even if what was left showed the most amount of skin out of what she owned. Or maybe Amy just missed them while gathering everything and making them unwearable...

"Well, either way, I was right about one thing," Lacey piped up, hands on her hips and eyes closed in an all-knowing manner.

Sammy tilted her head, confused. "What?"

She opened one eye and grinned at her. "That you _do_ look good in blue!"

The blonde quickly covered her already burning face. _'Darn it, it's too early for this, Lacey!'_ She quickly turned around without looking up and walked straight towards her bed. "I-I'm getting changed now, I'll meet you down on the ground."

"Alright, but be quick! We don't know when the challenge is gonna start yet!" Jasmine said before hopping off of the balcony and landing loudly on the ground, Lacey swiftly following her in the same way (and, by the sounds of it, landing not as gracefully).

The blush fading from her cheeks, Sammy reached for her duffel bag placed underneath the bottom bunk of her's and Lacey's bunkbed and retrieved her second, less-sweaty cheer uniform. Taking a brief glance in Scarlett's direction to make sure she _was_ still fast asleep (that girl slept heavier than even _her_, it seemed), Sammy retreated to the back corner of the room and quickly and quietly changed. As she did so, she felt a smile creeping over her face.

She could hardly believe it. She had been _asked_ to go and help them, not forced like what would have normally happened. The fact that Lacey and Jasmine were willing to ask her instead of drag her along against her will had her grinning from ear to ear. Never mind that the former was a little too hyperactive and overwhelming, and the latter was a just a tad bit bossy and intimidating - these two were genuinely interested in having her with them, and for that Sammy would put up with almost _anything_.

It was much better than having to spend every minute, awake or not, directly under Amy's thumb. _She_ would always force Sammy to do anything she personally didn't want to do, and Sammy never, _never_ had a say in it. It was either do it... or be punished. And those punishments were always really extreme, although Sammy personally hated being forcefully woken up in the middle of a peaceful sleep...

_'...Although, that actually just happened, didn't it?'_

Sammy's grin faltered and she took a lingering glance towards her bed, where Lacey had woken her up and caused a frightened jump out of the blonde. Normally that would be her reaction for _Amy_ attempting to wake her up, if she wasn't too deep into sleep, and the fact that it happened _here _of all places only proved one thing.

Despite being so far away from her, Sammy was still strapped tight to Amy's leash. And that probably wasn't going to change anytime soon.

With an agitated sigh, Sammy let her forehead come into contact with the wooden wall in front of her. _'I'm never going to get over this, am I? Not even the thought of having friends will help.'_

...

"...And that's pretty much the basics of foragin'. Think you can remember all that?"

Sammy swallowed nervously and nodded. There was a lot more to picking berries than she had previously thought. "I-I think so."

Jasmine smiled down at the girl as the three of them walked deeper into the forest, farther inward than where their shelter was located. "It's alright if you can't, just ask me if what you find is good enough."

Sammy's own smile turned into one of relief at that. "Okay, thanks. I appreciate it."

"No problem, mate. Least I could do for you guys, since you're willin' to get up so early and help me."

"You should be grateful," Lacey said to her in a snooty, fake British-accented voice from the back of their three-person line. "I wouldn't have bothered getting up at this _ungodly_ hour had it not for me being in such a good mood. Do note that I normally would not have troubled myself in aiding someone such as you in such a barbaric activity, and would have instead opted to remain in my given bed, if you can even _call_ it that."

Jasmine glanced back at her with a challenging grin. "Right, because I'm supposed to believe that you wouldn't be up early. And this is comin' from the girl who _was_ already up and spendin' more than an hour trying to find the lake."

Lacey's shocked face quickly fell into a pout. "What, seriously? You saw that? Dammit, I thought I was being sneaky!"

"You think a person who sleeps in tree branches wouldn't have eyes and ears like a hawk? You're only foolin' yourself if you think otherwise, mate."

The redhead's pout grew even more, with her brow arched and her cheeks puffed out, and Sammy and Jasmine couldn't help by laughing at how ridiculously comical she looked. Lacey eventually gave in, too, and the three of them shared a hearty laughing fit between each other. _'Gosh, when was the last time I laughed _this_ hard?'_

"But no, seriously, it's actually real nice havin' people with ya when you're out in the wilderness like this," Jasmine admitted between laughs. "It can get just a tad lonely when you're on your own out here."

"Oh man, I know what you mean," Lacey agreed eagerly. "Three people goin' out to hunt for wild berries for the rest of their team... Man, I haven't felt this excited to do anything in pretty much _ever!_"

The wording of that last sentence caused Sammy to pause for a second and think. _'Did she just say she hadn't had this much fun before? As in, 'ever'? I mean, I know _I_ wouldn't have had this much fun before, but someone like _Lacey...?_'_

Jasmine must've thought the same thing, for the taller girl stopped and turned around to face the girl in the back, looking puzzled. Sammy did just the same.

It took a few seconds for Lacey to stop herself, nearly running into Sammy at the same time. She blinked at the halted duo, looking at them back and forth. "What?" she asked the two of them. "Is there something on my face?"

"No, no, nothin' like that," Jasmine answered before scratching her head. "It's, ahh... what you said just then. Seems kinda odd that someone as outgoin' and cheerful as you had never done somethin' like this before. I mean, it's only berry pickin', so it's not _that_ excitin', but..."

And then, something happened in a second so swiftly that Sammy would not have caught it had she not been paying attention. Lacey's eyes went wider than Sammy had seen from her before, her body seemed to tense just a little, and she sucked in a tiny gasp; it was like she'd seen a real life, honest-to-goodness ghost. Her wide eyes then immediately skimmed the surrounding area, looking for something specific, until they landed at one point and found their way back to Jasmine's. "C-C-Contest!"

There was nothing but silence for a moment from everyone present, with confused stares being thrown all around. Eventually Jasmine was the first to speak again. "Uh... beg your pardon?"

"F-Foraging contest! You and me, me and you!" Lacey reached over and grabbed Sammy's shoulders and shook them rather hard. "And Sammy can be the judge!"

"Wha- M-Me?!" Sammy asked, unsuccessfully attempting to stop Lacey from shaking her brains out.

"Yeah!" Lacey stopped shaking the poor blonde and grinned at both of them. "Jazzy and I will gather the berries for breakfast and whoever finds the most by the end wins! Sounds good, right? It totally does!"

After another slightly awkward pause of trying to compute what had just been said, Jasmine slowly responded. "Erm... Okay, that's cool. I guess. Might as well make this a bit of a challenge anyway." Her sly grin returned as she started walking towards a bush. "But, you do realize who you're challengin', right? I don't carry the title 'Outback Survivalist' for nothin', y'know."

"All the more reason to test how well that title suits you!" Lacey ran past Sammy towards the same bush Jasmine arrived at.

"Hah! We'll see about that! Although, it shouldn't be how many we can get, rather it should be how many _edible_ ones we can find."

"Works for me! At least that way no one will be on the ground dying because of a few poisonous berries from this." She looked for a good spot to start at and, after finding it, started a countdown. "Alright, ready? We go in three-"

"Um, actually, wait, guys?" Sammy tried to interrupt, raising her finger in the air. "I-I didn't exactly-"

"-two one _go!_"

As soon as she said it, the two girls went right to work, focused solely on the game at hand and on absolutely nothing else, including the timid girl still trying to gain their attention.

"Guys, I-I didn't say I was..." She quickly lowered her hand back down and sighed wearily. "Oh, forget it." Sammy continued to stand in that spot, watching as Jasmine and Lacey rushed from one bush to the other, not saying a word to each other or anyone else (although Lacey did squeak when her hands came into contact with a thorn bush - Jasmine started chuckling to herself at that).

As she watched the two rush back and forth, Sammy couldn't help but recall exactly how Lacey had reacted just then, to when Jasmine commented on the wording of her sentence... She didn't back-pedal on it or correct it, but instead became tense and afraid of something. It was really only brief, but Sammy _knew_ she saw it.

Although... considering this was _Lacey_ of all people, it could have meant anything. And besides, it wasn't exactly Sammy's style to get into other people's business like that. So in the end, she decided to let the thought go.

She continued to stand in the same spot, idly looking around the area and taking in the sights of the beautiful summer morning breaking through the trees. Soon, however, Sammy decided that standing around doing nothing was the opposite of what she should have been doing. The girls asked her to come out and help get food for her team, and while they seemed to be doing an excellent job of that on their own, she wasn't about to let them do all the work. Besides, Jasmine gave her one of the sacks she had in the first place, so she was expected to help, right?

And with that, Sammy gave a sort-of-confident nod, and went to work on finding her own food to forage, keeping the others in her sights so as to not stray away and get lost, but also not getting in their way so she didn't disturb their competition.

_'Their 'competition', huh?'_ Sammy thought to herself with another smile. _'Seems like even though they've only known each other for no more than a day, they're still able to have friendly games like this... Actually, maybe I could join in next time? That might be nice...'_

Distracted by her thoughts, Sammy felt her foot come into contact with something that started rolling away. Glancing down, she saw the object and nearly gasped in surprise. "Ooh! Apples!" she announced happily. Apples were certainly one of her more favored fruits, with the bitterness that came from every bite to the juices that burst out of it... although honestly she did prefer the red variety more than the green kind like the one at her feet. Still, after not having one for _so long_ (Amy tended to have most of them herself... or all of them, for that matter), she couldn't resist picking it up and going to take a bite out of it, regardless of it having been on the ground for who knows how long.

But just as she was bringing it to her mouth to chomp down on it-

"_NOOOOOOOOOOOO!_"

The screaming unison between Jasmine and Lacey from not too far away caused Sammy to scream and jump, throwing the apple into the air in a panic. Just as it came back down and reached eye level with her again, a sharp stick suddenly sped out from her left and skewered itself through the apple, lodging both of them into the tree nearby.

Sammy, eyes still round with fright and her breathing still fast and shaky, turned to the other two girls, who both had panic-stricken faces equal to hers. "W-Why were you guys yelling like that?!" she cried out at them.

Lacey's frightened face contorted into confusion before she looked at Jasmine. "...Actually, yeah, why _were_ we yelling again?"

"I'm sorry about that," Jasmine apologised as she walked towards the tree where the stick had lodged itself. "But that's not an apple. It's-"

"A manchineel fruit," a different, less-female voice spoke up. The trio glanced upwards to the top of the tree where the apple (or manchineel fruit?) had been impaled to see Shawn from the opposing team standing at the very top branches. "The Spanish refer to it as, _manzanilla de la muerte_. AKA, 'the little apple of death,'" he continued, a dramatic glare on his face.

"'Of... _death_'?!" Sammy shouted, a horror-stricken look on her face. "Y-You mean I would've been dead if I had eaten that?!" Lacey had an equally as shocked look.

"Well, it probably wouldn't have killed you, but it would've made your mouth blister somethin' awful," Jasmine filled in, taking Sammy's hand and holding it up.

True to her's and Shawn's words, the hand Sammy had used to pick up the fruit had already broken out into multiple blisters and rashes and, having just taken notice of it then, immediately started to feel uncomfortable and itchy. "M-My hand!" Sammy gasped, desperately starting to scratch it with her other. "I-It's so itchy!"

"Oh my God! That looks... _really_ bad!" Lacey also took a look at her hand, eyebrows curved with worry. "It's like this already already, though...? Wow, imagine if you had actually swallowed that!"

Sammy whimpered at that terrible thought. Her throat, stomach, intestines, all of her insides basically would've been churning and punishing her for doing something so _stupid_, like she always would have done back at home. "I-I'd rather not imagine that right now, thanks," she mumbled.

"Congrats, princess," Shawn spoke up from behind her, having quickly made his way down from the top of the tree and onto the ground. "You just got your first lesson in Survival 101: know your flora. Lesson two: soak your hand in water, scrub it with sand, swelling: _gone_!" He emphasized this with a snap of his finger.

"Wait, just like that? Then that's easy, sure!" She turned to Shawn with a beaming grin. "Thanks, Shawn! You seem to know your way around the plants around here!"

"Actually, that's the weird bit about it," Shawn admitted, shooting a wary eye towards the machineel fruit. "Those little guys aren't even native around here. They're mostly common in Florida, the Bahamas, the Carribean... Mostly down south in the States, not western Canada! They shouldn't even be here!"

"Hey, now that you mention it, I just noticed somethin' strange like that, too," Jasmine replied, pointing back towards where she and Lacey had been competing. "Back over there is a Chinese mulberry bush, just growin' like every other plant here. This definitely isn't it's natural habitat; last I checked, this ain't China."

"Y-You think maybe they brought it over here, for... well, just because?" Sammy asked the two supposed nature experts, still idly scratching her burning hand. "Or maybe Chris just like having weird plants growing nearby?"

"Maybe that last idea, but the first one doesn't make much sense," Shawn replied with a hand to his chin. "Mulberries and machineel fruit aren't too well known over here, so I can't really see the point of-"

"Hey, HEY! Enough with the fruit talk, you fruits!" Lacey loudly interrupted him, drawing three sets of eyes her way. She rounded on Shawn and jabbed a finger at his chest, causing him to swiftly back away from her. She ignored that and continued. "You said all Sammy had to do was wash her hand and scrub it with sand and the swelling will go, right?"

"Give or take about five minutes of scrubbing, and her hand will look as good as new," Shawn answered without missing a beat. "No swelling, no blisters, no nothing."

Lacey nodded. "Good! Thanks again, we owe you." Lacey then turned to Sammy and started pushing her away by the shoulders. "C'mon, we need to clean that before the challenge starts!"

"Wait, what? Now?" Sammy said in surprise. "But we're supposed to help out Jasmine with the foraging!" Then again, it wasn't like she could really resist Lacey's shoving...

Jasmine offered Sammy a smile as the two walked by her. "You won't be of any help when your hand swells up like a wicket keeper's glove."

Sammy's and Lacey's feet stopped moving as both tried to figure out what Jasmine had just said. "Wick... what?" Lacey asked her confoundedly, looking back towards her. Sammy had about as much of an idea as the redhead had. Shawn, on his part, seemed to understand and was smiling sympathetically at Jasmine.

"Wicket keeper," Jasmine explained, her smile falling. "In cricket? You know, it's a game, where..."

Sammy and Lacey only continued to stare. _'Was that supposed to be a joke...? I'm not sure I get it.'_

Jasmine eventually gave up and slumped her shoulders. "Just go."

"Riiiiight... Anyways," Lacey replied, before going back to pushing Sammy's shoulders, "c'mon, let's get a move on."

"Um, okay," Sammy said, before glancing back at the other two. "Sorry for running off, Jasmine! And thanks, Shawn!"

"No problem!" the boy called back to her. "You have any problem with the plants and animals around here, I'd be happy to help! ...Unless it turns out they're undead and chasing you, in which case stay the _heck_ away from me!"

"Uh... undead?" Sammy spoke mostly to herself. She looked up at Lacey, who merely shrugged. "Um, okay, I'll keep that in mind! ...I guess."

...

Lacey quickly led the shorter girl to the beach nearby their shelter. The sun had rose a fair distance into the sky by that point, so going by the previous seasons of the show, the next challenge could start at any minute.

Which was exactly why Lacey had quickened her pace and had chosen to start dragging Sammy to the shores instead of pushing her. "Quickly, darn it! We want that swelling _gone_ before the challenge starts! Or before it gets any worse, which it might if we don't _hurry up!_"

"I-I'm hurrying as fast as I can!" Sammy cried back to her, painfully aware at how much faster at running the redhead was compared to her.

Lacey turned back towards Sammy. "Well hurry up with the hurrying! We really don't have much ti-" A splash interrupted her command, halting both girls in their tracks. They looked down to see that Lacey's sandal had sank into the rising tide. "Oh. We're here. Sweet." She immediately fell to her knees and pulled Sammy down along with her. "Shawn never said anything about this hurting, so if it starts hurting, sorry." She dunked Sammy's hand into the cold ocean water, which was actually quite refreshing after scratching at it for the last five or so minutes. Sammy couldn't help but release a sigh of relief at the wondrous sensation, but it was quickly replaced with small yelps when the rough feeling of sand started vigorously moving over her hand. "Hey, like I said, I'm sorry!" Lacey exclaimed.

"I-I know, but - _ow!_ - I wasn't expecting it right - _eep!_ - away. Just keep - _agh!_ - just keep rubbing!" Sammy instructed between shouts.

Lacey grinned. "Can do! Rubbing stuff is one of my specialt- ...Uh, I'm not gonna finish that." Ignoring her cut-off sentence, Lacey quickened her scrubbing while Sammy's grunts sped up as well, the blonde trying her best to hold the them in.

After about five more minutes of uneventful cleansing, Lacey suddenly stopped and, after a questioning look from Sammy, allowed her to lift her hand out of the water. Sammy did just that and nearly gasped at how unswollen and clean her hand had become. "Oh, wow, that _really _worked! Shawn was right, my hand _does _look good as new!"

"Phew! Glad that's over with," Lacey grinned, grabbing Sammy's hand and inspecting it herself. Upon grasping it though, she started feeling the palm of her hand and she blinked in surprise. "Whoooaa, wow, your skin's actually really soft because of that. Or, wait, is it because-?" She quickly reached for Sammy's other hand and started feeling _that_ palm too. Sammy honestly was a little weirded out by it but allowed Lacey to do so either way. "Holy crud, this one's soft too. Your skin's, like, naturally as soft as a baby's butt!"

Sammy cringed at that odd analogy. "Can we, um, not use that as a description for my skin? It doesn't exactly sit well with me..."

"Huh? Oh, yeah, sure," Lacey responded without glancing up from the hand. "How about... as delicate as a flower?"

That... sounded a lot better, actually. Kind of poetic, too. "Yeah, that sounds much better," Sammy replied with an embarrassed giggle. "Thanks again for helping, Lacey. I really appreciate it." In her head, she added, _'Although I _do_ kinda wish I did it myself...'_

Lacey looked up and grinned. "Hey, it's no problem! Like Shawn said earlier, 'I'm happy to help!' Although since I don't really know my flora and fauna from different parts of the world, I guess I have to settle for more practical uses of help. But still, some help is better than none!"

Sammy nodded happily at her, but then a thought occurred to her: Lacey seemed to have a strong fondness for helping people out. She helped Beardo out with yesterday's challenge, with Max after he got trampled, and with Sammy herself after she accidentally slipped and bumped her head... And now here she was again, aiding her with her little machineel mistake.

"Say, Lacey?" Sammy spoke up suddenly, surprising even herself.

"Hm? What's up?" the other girl asked, having switched back to Sammy's other hand to make sure it was perfectly healed.

Sammy sort of regretted even getting her attention for the question, but she figured she was already in too far to back out, and knowing Lacey, she'd probably try to pry the question out of her anyway. "I was, um, just wondering... Why do you like helping people so much? I mean, you don't have to answer if you don't want to, I was just kinda curious about it, although it p-probably seems like a stupid question to ask in the first place, yeah, you know what, j-just ignore I even said anyth-"

"Because I just like helping people I guess."

Sammy shut herself up at Lacey's answer, grimacing that she let herself start rambling again, and at such a silly provocation too. She was definitely going to have to work on that, it seemed. "Y-Yeah?"

"Yeah," Lacey nodded in agreement. "Not really sure how to explain it, but, like... I guess I just like seeing people's happy faces when I help them out? It's not that big a deal, is it?"

"What?" Sammy asked before shaking her head violently. "No, of course not! I was just wondering, is all."

Lacey smiled, reassured. "Ahh, okay. Well yeah, it's pretty much for that reason. Or at least, it's the only reason I can come up with right now. I mean, someone like Max, right? Doesn't normally smile all that often, too busy playing the role of the stereotypical villain. But when I helped him out yesterday he, like, _genuinely_ smiled at me! Like, dropped that whole act and everything! I'm not really sure if I'm explaining it right, but I guess it's just like... seeing them happy makes me happy? I guess?"

Sammy shook her head once again, this time slower and her lips forming a smile. "No, no, that makes sense. Their happiness is your happiness, right?"

"Right! Yes, I _knew_ you'd understand!" Lacey's grin suddenly fell and she looked back up at Sammy. "Oh, actually, there was something _I_ wanted to ask too, if it's okay." At Sammy's nod, she continued. "Ahh... About earlier this morning, wha-"

Before she could finish, an abrupt screeching filled the beach and likely the entire island, coming from one of the many speaker systems located practically everywhere. Sammy and Lacey winced at the intensity of the white noise, before Chris' voice replaced it entirely.

"Campers!" he started off. "The only good thing about this morning is... that it's gonna get worse. For you." He chuckled at his statement, while Sammy huffed out a sigh. Of course it was going to get worse. "There's a path heading into the forest. Follow it to today's hurt-_tacular_ challenge."

With that, the speakers shut off, leaving two half-deaf teenagers on the beach's shore. "'Hurt-tacular'?" Lacey repeated with disgust. "Does he seriously come up with that himself? Sheesh, he really needs to lay off the terrible puns. If you can even call them that."

"Um, well, either way, it was a good thing we washed my hand quickly, or else we'd end up being late..." Sammy noted, standing to her feet and wiping the water off onto her skirt.

"You got that right," Lacey responded, also standing up. "Eh, I'll... ahh, probably ask that some other time. My question, that is. No need to be doing so now. Anyways!" She quickly turned toward the path leading back up into the forest, not exactly waiting for Sammy to follow. "Which path was it again? There's so many of them we probably _will_ end up late..."

Sammy giggled through her nose as she followed Lacey, but swiftly turned it into a sigh. _'About this morning, huh? Great, I knew she was gonna ask about that... Ugh, this isn't going to end well for me, is it?'_

...

A/N: Yes, I've returned with the next chapter! Sorry for the little wait, things to do and all that.

Hopefully everyone is liking it so far! There's a lot of thought going into this fic and I'm really glad that so many people are enjoying it so far! It always makes me smile whenever I see someone has Favorited/Followed the story, or even reviewed it! And so to everyone who has done just that so far, I extend to you my thanks! -bows-

Also, on that note, I have something to tell you guys. To those of you saying it'd be a good idea to feature more than just the trio of Sammy/Lacey/Jasmine... fear not. In the coming chapters, there's going to be a bit more focus on the other campers as well, along with their interactions with Sammy and the others! Thanks for your patience!

And another thing to note: because of some things I need to take care of in real life, I probably won't be able to write for about a week or so. So don't really expect an update until late next week. Sorry!

And with that, I'd like to bid all of you adieu! Again, thanks to Nick for helping me out with this! I appreciate it a lot, man!

(And I should have this somewhere, but I don't own Total Drama at all. The only thing I own is Lacey, and even then she's not even copyrighted, so I'm not sure if that works that way. Oh well. See ya!)


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